Daniel Rigotti1, Lutz Achtnichts2, Oded Gonen1, James Babb1, Yvonne Naegelin2, Kerstin Bendtfeld2, Jochen Hirsch2, Michael Amann2, Robert I. Grossman1, Ludw
1Radiology, New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY, United States; 2Radiology, University Hospital Basel, Basel, Switzerland
We test the hypothesis that neural preservation, reflected by whole-brain N-acetylaspartate (WBNAA) in benign multiple sclerosis (MS) is similar to healthy contemporaries and higher than more clinically disabled patients of similar disease duration. WBNAA was obtained from 24 benign and 16 non-benign MS patients and 17 age-matched controls. While control's had significantly higher WBNAA (12.22.3mM), than either group (benign: 10.52.4, non-benign:10.12.3mM, (p0.04)), patients were similar as they were in other metrics (atrophy and T2 hyperintense lesion volume but not T1 hypointense load). Surprisingly, neural integrity/preservation is not a characteristic of benign MS, possibly reflecting fortunate sparing of eloquent brain regions.