During the 1990s, the American-led project to discover and decode all the genes in the human body focused attention on the role of genes in many diseases. A monumental study of 15,000 people with MS, including some identical twins who were reared miles apart in different families, clearly demonstrated that there is a genetic determinant to who gets MS and who does not. Although there does not appear to be any single “MS gene”, there does seem to be something fundamental to each of us (i.e., something in our genes), which helps determine who will get MS. This is yet another clue to the cause of the disease.

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Written by Loren A. Rolak, MD. Reproduced by permission from the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, USA. © NMSS, 2003