"Using Diet To Counter The Effects Of Multiple Sclerosis"
A new study of multiple sclerosis patients examines how a strict diet may ease the symptoms of the disease. MS, a potentially disabling disease of the central nervous system, affects about 400,000 people in the US and it’s two to three times more common among women. Current treatments may have severe side effects, and there is no cure. A cutting-edge, but low-tech attempt to slow the symptoms involves the diet and the microbiome -- bacteria that live mostly in our digestive tract, unique to us as a fingerprint. Research now underway at The Mount Sinai Hospital is studying how food might be used as medicine to combat the disease. Ilana Katz Sand, MD, assistant professor of neurosurgery at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai is leading one of the first clinical trials to study the link between what we eat, gut bacteria, and MS symptoms. "The gut is actually kind of a natural place to look," Dr. Katz Sand said. "And that's because the immune system, about 70 percent of it, lives inside the gut, and has far-reaching implications throughout the rest of the body."
- Ilana Katz Sand, MD, Assistant Professor, Neurology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai