Many disorders share symptoms with MS, sometimes complicating its diagnosis.
Getting a correct diagnosis of multiple sclerosis (MS) can be a challenge. In fact, a study published in May 2019 in the journal Multiple Sclerosis and Related Disorders suggested that nearly 1 in 5 people with other neurologic conditions are mistakenly diagnosed with MS.
These errors in diagnosis likely result from the fact that there is no single test that can determine an MS diagnosis conclusively. Also, not everyone has all of the common symptoms of MS, such as numbness, tingling, pain, fatigue, and heat sensitivity. And to complicate matters, the symptoms you do have may resemble those of some other conditions.
To figure out what’s causing possible MS symptoms, doctors look at your medical history, the results of a neurological exam, and an MRI — and sometimes do a spinal tap (also called a lumbar puncture), says Jack Burks, MD, a neurologist and chief medical officer for the Multiple Sclerosis Association of America. “The diagnosis can also require eliminating the possible MS mimicker diseases,” he says. That leads to an MS diagnosis by exclusion.
“Misdiagnosis in MS has been an issue that’s been talked about for 40 years,” adds Jeffrey Cohen, MD, director of experimental therapeutics at the Mellen MS Center of the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. “And even with refinement of diagnostic criteria and the availability of technologies like MRI, it’s still a problem. There are a significant number of people getting misdiagnosed with MS in part because there’s no single test for it, like a blood test. ”Here are some of the conditions that are sometimes mistaken for multiple sclerosis: Conditions mistaken for MS