Quote:
Originally Posted by Riverwild
The BBB is supposed to be impermeable. Rogue T cells and WBCs are what gets by when the BBB loses that impermeability. Tysabri acts to block the T cells and the WBCs from crossing the BBB, restoring the BBB to impermeability. WBCs are the signal that there is inflammation. The body sends them out to fight it. That's why lesions are created, the WBCs are fighting the rogue T cell damage. We don't know why those T cells go rogue or why they are able to get into the brain or why the BBB opens. Tysabri doesn't block them all but it stops a lot of them. That is why some people still have relapses and lesions. There is still damage going on in many cases.
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The way I've read it explained before (but it was in reference to how they thought PML was occurring with the use of Tysabri) . . . Tysabri's mechanisms are based on the belief that Multiple Sclerosis is caused when T-cells (which are the soldiers in the immune system), "mistakenly attack the lining of nerves in the brain. Without this lining, cells stop functioning and die. Tysabri works by preventing the T-cells from entering the brain. (But those same T-cells normally keep the virus that causes PML in check. If that virus, which is dormant in most people, is allowed to run rampant, it damages or destroys the brain)."
So, I see where you are coming from with the explanation on Tysabri managing new lesions/inflammation, etc. and how it could be effective for that purpose.
The part I'm still confused about though is how an infusion would seem to be CAUSING a fever for Natalie. While I can see how Tysabri might be controlling the inflammation from causing more inflammatory lesions (which is perhaps why she had so many fevers before Tysabri, and isn't now), I still don't understand why is it that every time she has an infusion she seems to get a fever for a few days?
Cherie
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