The investigation of diagnostic value of laboratory and paraclinic tests in the patients with multiple sclerosis

Abstract

Multimodal evoked potentials were recorded, cranial magnetic resonance imaging and examination of cerebrospinal fluid were done in the patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). The aim of this study is to search and compare the diagnostic value of these tests and investigations in MS. Thirty-five patients were included in this study. Thirteen of them were male and twenty-two were female. The ratio between female and male was 1.64. Thirty-one patient were classified as definite MS and four patients were classified as possible MS according to the criteria defined by Poser. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was found more sensitive than recordings of evoked potentials and cerebrospinal fluid analysis. Visual evoked potentials (VEP) and posterior tibial somatosensory evoked potentials (SEP) were the most sensitive tests and brainstem auditory evoked potentials (BAEP) was the least sensitive tests among all neurophysiological tests. Recordings of evoked potentials was useful in the demonstration of silent lesions.