Assessment of Cyclophosphamide in Relapsing Remitting Multiple Sclerosis

Abstract

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic neurological disease of unknown cause sustained by a widespread inflammatory process within the CNS leading to multifocal demyelination and axonal loss mostly in the white matter but importantly also in the grey matter of both brain and spinal cord (Kutzelnigg and Lassmann, 2014). Currently approved disease modifying therapies either immunomodulatory or immunosuppressive drugs, although variably have a favorable impact on relapsing remitting MS, they have no significant benefit in progressive MS after it has started (Wingerchuk and Carter, 2014). Thus, the potential advantage of a given treatment is limited to a period early in the course of MS ‘windows of opportunity’ for each patient, depending on individual characteristics and disease stage to achieve a favourable outcome (Ziemssen et al., 2015).