Oh, hey, it's a cough drop in your purse that you don't want to unwrap, but you desperately want to unwrap. Allie Ward with an episode that's close to my heart, and there's a chance that you or someone you love may have been affected by it. And the verdict is, it's not fun. And a lot of people don't really get what it is. This one's on multiple sclerosis. So if you like to understand how your body routes messages to itself,

this is also a great one to get a grasp on that. So this topic is close to my family as my mom,

your fancy Nancy, who originated the categories insomnia buster that we talked about in the

somnology episodes on sleep. Y'all love her. You love that. So my mom was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis

over 20 years ago. And our family has had to go from like, what is this to how can I seek out

the world's foremost expert on this and ask all of our questions on behalf of people with MS. So

that's what we did here. So this expert did their undergrad at Oberlin College, got an MD at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, and then hopped over to the University of Michigan for their resident and internship programs before another two-year fellowship.

And they are a board-certified neurologist specializing in multiple sclerosis and founded the Boster Center for MS. They've been involved

with a ton of clinical trials. They've had so many papers published and also does awesome outreach

to the public and people with MS via their YouTube channel, which has nearly 100,000 subscribers.

They're pretty much the goat when it comes to MS. So we're

going to talk to them in a moment, but first thank you to all the listeners who are signed up at

patreon.com slash ologies, who support the show for a dollar or more a month and also submit

their questions for episodes. Thanks to everyone wearing ologies merch from ologiesmerch.com.

And of course, also for zero dollars, you can support Ologies by leaving a review, which keeps us up in the charts and as proof that I do read all of them. I pick one each week. And this one is from R.J. LaCount, who wrote, nerds unite, love this show so much. And the merch is an absolute nerd magnet. They wore their Oogies shirt when they were at the hospital all day

and got more compliments from medical staff than they have on anything they've worn. They wrote.

So RJ LaCount, thank you for wrapping us. Also, hospitals, great place to meet other ologites.

Can attest 10 out of 10. Also, if you have little ones and you're looking for any classroom

say versions of ologies, we release them every week for free in their own feed. It's called Smologis-S-M-O-L-O-G-I-E-S. You can find anywhere you get podcasts, Classroom Safe G-rated. It's also linked in the show notes. And thanks, of course, to sponsors of the show who make it possible to donate to a cause of the ologists choosing each

week. Okay, onward. Just to get legal about it for a sec, this podcast is not intended to treat

or diagnose and is for informational purposes only because this is a podcast and it is not your doctor.

So let's hear all about how nerve tissue works, how your spinal cord is like a holiday decoration,

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