(Madrid. Lucila Rodríguez) multiple sclerosis patients

The Neurology Service of the Ruber Internacional Hospital will organize two workshops aimed at patients with multiple sclerosis, a demyelinating autoimmune disease of the central nervous system, of which 1,800 new cases are diagnosed each year in Spain and which usually appears between the ages of 20 and 40.

This is the first time that the service has launched these training sessions in which patients, 20 in total, will be informed free of charge about the reasons why they suffer from certain symptoms and will also be offered tools to treat them, better cope with the disease and improve their quality of life.

Specifically, the first workshop, to be held on October 26, will analyze fatigue in multiple sclerosis, since this symptom can affect between 80% and 90% of patients at some point in their disease, significantly impairing their social or family activities. This workshop will be attended by the neurologist and assistant physician of the Clinical Neurology Unit of the Ruber Internacional Hospital, Fernando Pérez Parra, as well as the physiotherapist Lucía Vacas; the occupational therapist, María Ángeles Alonso; and the psychologist Blanca Borda.

“In the Neurology and Neuro-rehabilitation service of the Ruber International Hospital, we have a multidisciplinary team that allows us to address in a comprehensive manner many of the problems presented by people with Multiple Sclerosis. We have physiotherapists, occupational therapists, speech therapists, clinical psychologists and neuropsychologists. We wanted to take advantage of all this potential and professional experience to offer people with multiple sclerosis some theoretical and practical workshops that we believe are of interest and can be very useful,” explains Pérez Parra.

The second workshop will be held on March 7, 2024 and will analyze the cognitive deterioration that occurs in multiple sclerosis and that can even appear in the earliest stages of the disease. In addition to Dr. Pérez Parra, neuropsychologists Antonio del Barrio and Natalia Pasquín will participate in this training, who will explain to the attendees how to detect, evaluate and treat the cognitive problems associated with the disease.

“Both fatigue and cognitive problems can and should be treated from a multidisciplinary point of view, and this is something that our center has the capacity to offer. The physiotherapists, clinical psychologist, neuropsychologists, occupational therapist and speech therapist are excellent professionals who I am convinced will provide very practical information to the attendees,” says the doctor.

The aim of the service is to continue with these workshops throughout the year 2024 in which other topics of special importance for these patients will be addressed, such as family planning, pregnancy and breastfeeding, urological and proctological problems, or pain. “We will continue working to provide information and therapeutic tools to help improve the quality of life of people with Multiple Sclerosis,” Pérez Parra concludes.