As you may have heard, Christina Applegate revealed on October 20 that her doctors now say she does not have multiple sclerosis, the diagnosis she has carried since 2021. Her symptoms haven't gone away, and she says she's back at square one.
MS is notoriously difficult to diagnose. Misdiagnosis is well documented, and at the same time many people with MS wait years for an answer while doctors try to piece together a collection of nonspecific symptoms. Part of the challenge is that there's no single test that proves you have it or don't. That matters because, in modern medicine, the diagnosis largely determines which drugs we reach for. When the label disappears, so does the treatment roadmap.
Whenever we hit a roadblock and can't find answers, it's an opportunity to ask different questions. If you were locked out of your house, your first question might be, "How can I get this door to open?" When you find no satisfactory answer, you might change the question to, "How else can I get into my house?" That question opens up other possibilities.
Similarly, when we can't answer the question, "What is the diagnosis?" we can ask, "What disturbances in the body could be causing these distressing and persistent symptoms?"
Of course, that comes after the conventional workup has been done well: a thorough neurological evaluation, imaging, and ruling out the conditions that can mimic MS. Once that's done, this new question opens up other possibilities worth exploring:
- What toxins are present?
- Are there any hidden infections?
- Is mitochondrial dysfunction a problem?
- What is the health of the cell membranes?
- Is there nervous system dysfunction?
- Is the immune system being triggered inappropriately?
There's a certain comfort that doctors and patients get from attaching a label to a problem. The doctor knows which drugs to use, and the patient feels validated. It feels much better to say, "I have MS," than to say, "I can't work. I don't feel right. I'm depressed. I'm exhausted. My balance is off. My vision is getting worse." Without a diagnosis, a person is always trying to convince those around them, and sometimes themselves, that it's not all in their head, that something really is wrong, and that they really do want to work and take part in all the usual activities of life, but their health is stopping them.
Medicine has been here before. For decades, stomach ulcers were blamed on stress and spicy food, and patients were told to relax and drink milk. Then, in the 1980s, two Australian doctors showed that a bacterium, H. pylori, was behind most ulcers, and a condition people had been told was their lifestyle became treatable with antibiotics. The patients hadn't changed. The question had.
For everyone like Christina, whether misdiagnosed with MS or simply holding symptoms that don't fit into a neat box with a label on it, there is hope. Sometimes we just can't put a name on a disease or a constellation of symptoms. But maybe that's not the end of the world if we can still help you live a healthier life. After all, disease or not, what really matters is whether you can fully participate in life, and keep doing so for years to come.
If you or someone you know has a challenging case, give us a call. At Prestige Wellness Institute, you have access to the latest medical science has to offer, including several options even Christina Applegate hasn’t tried yet.
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