Mirla Avila, MD, explains the importance of regular follow-up care, monitoring for new symptoms, and seeking prompt medical attention when concerns arise.
Transcript
So this depends a lot on the physician. To me, I like to reassess my patients every six months, make sure they’re doing well. There’s no change in their disability. They’re tolerating the medication well.
But if there’s any issue, we need to do a reassessment sooner. So I encourage my patients, if you notice any new symptoms, if you have any concern, anything new that appears and you have a question, reach out to us.
And if that is the case, we see them sooner in clinic or sometimes we have to send them to the ER if that is the case and order a stat MRI. So depending on the symptom and the aggressiveness, we will act.
But we always tell patients, we encourage them to reach out to us. And if this is outside of the business hours and they’re having an acute issue, then we always encourage them to go to the ER because remember, time is brain.
If they are having a new NMOSD attack, this can be very debilitating. So we want to treat it as soon as possible.
