Tag Archives: Cytoxan

HSCT for Relapse Remitting Multiple Sclerosis – Phase 3 Clinical Trial

Here is the direct link from ClinicalTrials.gov to (MOST) – Maximizing Outcome of Multiple Sclerosis Transplantation.
This is the study, run by Dr. Richard Burt, that is currently recruiting people ages 18-58 with RRMS (Relapse Remitting Multiple Sclerosis) at Northwestern in Chicago, Illinois.
You will be able to see and read about all the criteria necessary to apply to the study as well as the protocol and contact information.

https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/study/NCT03342638


Study Description

Brief Summary:
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is at onset an immune-mediated demyelinating disease. In most cases, it starts as a relapsing-remitting disease with distinct attacks and no symptoms between flares. Over years or decades, virtually all cases transition into a progressive disease in which insidious and slow neurologic deterioration occurs with or without acute flares. Relapsing-remitting disease is often responsive to immune suppressive or modulating therapies, while immune based therapies are generally ineffective in patients with a progressive clinical course. This clinical course and response to immune suppression, as well as neuropathology and neuroimaging studies, suggest that disease progression is associated with axonal atrophy. Disability correlates better with measures of axonal atrophy than immune mediated demyelination. Therefore, immune based therapies, in order to be effective, need to be started early in the disease course while MS is predominantly an immune-mediated and inflammatory disease. While current immune based therapies delay disability, no intervention has been proven to prevent progressive disability. The investigators propose a randomized study of autologous unmanipulated peripheral blood hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT) comparing two different conditioning regimens: (1) cyclophosphamide and rabbit anti-thymoglobulin (rATG) versus (2) cyclophosphamide, rATG, and Intravenous Immunoglobulin (IVIg).

Two more days until my Stemmie Birthday!!!

​Had a relatively uneventful day but busy morning. Everything seems to start at 4:30am here… vital signs, bloodwork, early morning meds, orthostatics, shower, meeting with the transplant team at 8:45,  hanging the chemo, then steroids, then rATG.
I was able to sleep on and off through a lot of the Cytoxan but did end up with some wicked nausea and a headache, with which he nurses helped me with some anyinausea meds and Tylenol. 

After getting up I was so blessed to have three lovely ladies come visit me, two of whom are shortly starting the process that I am going through currently. It’s so great to have such a nice “stem family” as we call it to share our experiences. Everyone is different in their own special way, but we are all fighting for a common goal… to CURE our Multiple Sclerosis!

Tonight my last bag of meds ends at 1:15am, so I’ll be woken up by that and then the morning will begin again at 4:30!  However, I am done now with the Cytoxan and will be only getting steroids and rATG.  And then my Stem Cell Birthday arrives on Feb. 23rd.  I am so incredibly excited!!!

So far so good! Have a great night everyone! Will try to update again tomorrow!

#HSCT #CureMS #DrBurt #stemcells #nochemonocure

3rd day of chemo

It’s been a pretty good day. This early morning I was woken a few times for medications, blood draw, and EKG. Got the rest of my head shaved before my shower because it was falling out in a pretty funky pattern LOL


Later Dr. Burt came for a visit and said everything looked good so far. I then went for a walk in the hallway with my cane. Three laps with 3 rests! Woo hoo! (17 laps is a mile) Then I got all my premeds before starting my chemo at 11. Took a nice nap and then did another 3 laps with 3 rests. Now I’m fighting a bit of nausea and just got meds for that. Still have IV rATG running until midnight tonight. All in all everything is going very well today!