MS patients may have drug rebound

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands, Sept. 14 (UPI) -- Patients with multiple sclerosis who stop taking the drug natalizumab may experience a rebound increase in disease activity, a Dutch study found.

Study author Dr. Machteld Vellinga of VU University Medical Center in Amsterdam said the study involved 21 people who had MRI scans of their brains taken before taking natalizumab, and again an average of 15 months after receiving the last infusion of the drug.

The drug is given by IV infusion once a month. The participants were divided into two groups: one group took the drug for an average of three years, and the other took the drug for an average of two months.

The study, published in Neurology, found that the participants developed more than three times as many brain lesions -- or areas of damage in the brain that are a marker of MS disease activity -- in the 15-month period after discontinuing the drug than they had developed before they started taking the drug. The results were most pronounced for those who took the drug for only a short time.

More research needs to be done with larger numbers of patients before any recommendations can be made about use of the drug, Vellinga said.