“MS is an autoimmune disease; it has nothing to do with the vascular system.”

Currently, there is no proven “cause” of multiple sclerosis. While immune system activity has been clearly linked with MS, there is no proven explanation of what actually initiates the abnormal immune system response.   What we can definitively say is that there is a critical immune system component to MS, and that at least some aspects of the immune component are, to some extent, responsive to pharmaceuticals (for many Relapsing Remitting patients, at least). To deny the positive effects of drugs would be to disregard a large body of well established research.

Similarly, given the long history documenting the venocentric nature of MS, together with both published and emerging peer-reviewed scientific research linking MS and the vascular system^5,6,7,8,9, it is becoming increasingly clear that there is a significant vascular component to MS as well. If CCSVI and other vascular/MS research continues to establish this relationship, perhaps the most fruitful questions moving forward will be:

• "What is the exact relationship between the vascular and immune system components of MS?”
• "Might vascular treatment of MS be complimentary to traditional immune therapy, given that there are no apparent risks in combining these treatments?”

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