betaseron

The message below is a reader’s story sent to me by a reader named Kathy (http://gilenya-girl.blogspot.com/ ) who is also using a blog to chronicle her adventures in treating MS with Gilenya. She’s had tremendous success with it right away. Stories like this give me so much hope!

I have had MS since 1987, although it was not diagnosed until 1992. This is often the case with MS, as we all know. I have been on Beta Seron since 1993. I tried Ampyra last year with no success. I had a major flare-up about four months ago, and steroids no longer worked. My doctor gave me the choice of Gilenya or Tysabri. I hate MRI’s and they are necessary when you are on Tysabri. I selected Gilenya!

Switching To Gilenya — Gilenya (Fingolimod)

As it turns out, similarly to my father’s results with Avonex, Rebif has caused my liver enzymes to shoot up to about 3X the upper limit of normal in the span of slightly less than 2 years. My options?

1) Tysabri : the risk of PML is too severe for me to brave this drug – reputed to be a risk of death or severe disability as high as 1 in 200 for some individuals and 1 in 2000 for others
2) Copaxone : statistically slightly less effective than interferons – works great for my father but I truly don’t want to do a daily injection except as a last resort
3) Gilenya : aka Fingolimod – when this was approved by the FDA I wrote a blog post to summarize all the information I could find – it is the only oral disease modifying drug for Multiple Sclerosis – DING! DING! DING!

I have chosen to switch to Gilenya.

A Reader’s Story – Kathy’s Success With Gilenya

Diary Of A Gilenya Pioneer: Switching To Gilenya!