How often can a relapse attack same place?

[fatigued]

Can you have one exacerbation and then years later MS attacks the exact same place? And if yes, is recovery still possible?

[SNOOPY]

Yes to both questions.

Do you have a diagnosis of MS, fatigued?

[fatigued]

Yes to both questions.

Do you have a diagnosis of MS, fatigued?

Hi have rrms. I guess my concern is that if I get another bout of ON (had it 3 times), I may not recover as well.

Do you know if there are nerves in the CNS are long? By this I mean does MS always attack the same lesion or can it affect the same nerve just a different part?

[SNOOPY]

Hi fatigued,

MS attacks the Myelin sheath and scars appear (lesions). This causes a "short circuit" in our wiring (Central Nervous System). Lesions can heal, disappear and/or more or less lesions will show on MRI.

Lesions affect the smooth communication that occurs along the CNS pathways.

Due to the unpredictability of this disease there is no way to know if your next exacerbation or your progression will affect the same area or if you will experience new damage with new symptoms.

Sorry, I know that doesn't give you a definite answer but sadly none of us know what this disease will do to day or even years down the line.

Take care

[jreagan70]

Hi fatigued:

MS can do whatever it wants to. It can attack the same place or different places. And it can be different for different people. In some people the same areas are attacked and there's kind of a trend, and in other people the attacks are in different places.

Since MS can attack wherever it wants to, it can attack the same group of nerves in the same place or at a different place along the same group of nerves. Or some place completely different. That's something that might be interesting to know but isn't something to worry about because you don't have any control over it.

Since you've already had ON 3 times, it's possible that your MS likes to attack along your optic nerve(s) more than anywhere else. My MS is like that, too. That doesn't seem fair when half of people with MS never have ON. But other people might have MS that has attacked a different area more than once. Or people who have only had a particular area affected each time, but they've had episodes that affected many different areas so they have symptoms all over their body.

And it's possible that the more episodes of ON you have in the same eye, the more damage is done and the less well it will recover each time. Maybe, maybe not. It's something to be aware of, but it's not worth worrying in advance about something that may never happen.

You don't have any control over where the attack is. So the best thing you can do is to be on an MS medicine that reduces the number of relapses you have.

[pennstater]

As Snoopy said, definite yes to both. I have had relapses that affected same symptoms. In some cases, full recovery, in other cases, recovery was less complete.

Unfortunately, MS doesn't seem to care whether prior damage or not. And there is no way to know how it will behave.

Hope your relapse is over quickly.