RMS Terms and Definitions
It isn’t easy remembering every word or term associated with relapsing multiple sclerosis (RMS), but getting familiar with the following list could ultimately help you better understand RMS and help you find the best treatment for you.
Persistent worry about major or minor concerns that interferes with daily activities like work, school, or sleep. Anxiety can disrupt relationships and enjoyment of life, but can be managed by lifestyle changes, counseling, and/or treatments.
A condition where, often for unknown reasons, the body attacks its own tissues as if they were foreign substances such as bacteria and viruses.
The CNS consists of the brain and spinal cord and is enclosed within the skull and spine. It receives, processes, and stores information from the peripheral nerves and sends out messages telling the body how to respond.
Persisting for a long time or constantly recurring, RMS is a chronic disease. Other examples of chronic diseases include cardiovascular disease and diabetes.
Your cognition refers to processes involved in knowing, learning, and understanding things. These processes include memory, thinking, processing information, attention, and concentration.
A treatment used to treat a variety of conditions. It can help reduce inflammation and suppress the immune system.
A group of treatments for RMS. They may work to slow the damage in RMS such as lesions and brain shrinkage. They can potentially help to reduce the number and severity of relapses and slow disability progression.
A system in the body that distinguishes everything foreign to the body and protects it against infections and foreign substances.
Inflammation is one way in which your body fights against foreign substances like bacteria and viruses, while also getting rid of cells that are already dying. However, if inflammation happens when it’s not supposed to it can cause damage, like in RMS.
Also called an intravenous infusion, an infusion is a method used to administer treatments directly into the vein via a drip and is usually carried out in a hospital.
A way of administering medication using a needle and syringe. There are different types of injections including subcutaneous (which are injected under the skin) and intramuscular (which are injected into the muscle).
A lesion is an area of the central nervous system that has been damaged by RMS. They are caused by the inflammation that happens when the immune system attacks myelin.
MRI uses a magnetic field and radio waves to create detailed images of the organs and tissues in the body. MRI is used on the brain and spinal cord to help see lesions and diagnose RMS.
A chronic autoimmune disorder that affects the CNS. In multiple sclerosis, inflammation attacks the myelin and stops and/or limits the information transmission from nerves.
The protective layer around the nerve fibers in the CNS, which the immune system mistakenly attacks in RMS, causing inflammation. See what happens to myelin when RMS is present.
A medication such as a tablet or capsule that is taken by mouth.
The name for an event when new symptoms of relapsing-remitting MS (RRMS) appear, or when old symptoms return to the same or a new area of the body for a period of 24 hours or more. You might also hear relapses be called flare-ups, exacerbations, attacks, worsening, acute episodes, or clinical events. Learn about the difference between symptoms and relapses.
When a person living with RMS has partially or completely recovered from a relapse, and when few or no RMS symptoms are currently present.