Where do MS lesions typically show up? I saw a new neurologist recently and he wants me to do an MRI of the cervical and chest spine, but he didn't mention anything about the brain. My previous MRI last year was of the brain/neck spine with my first neurologist, and the brain was crystal clear. The neck showed some minor arthritis.

Does MS show up in the brain and only in a certain part of the spine, or can it show up all over like in the chest and lumbar region too? I just wonder why only specific areas were chosen by my new neuro. Things I don't think about asking until after the fact...I think we can all relate to that sometimes.

Next time I see my neuro I may just ask for the brain scan too. It's going to make me so paranoid if the MRI is clear but since the brain wasn't checked I still won't have full confidence. If you can't tell, I suffer from anxiety and am a hypochondriac. Often times I don't know if my symptoms are real or not and that's such a frustrating thing. I'm only 25 and have so much life to live...healthily!

I was diagnosed in 1998 after optic neuritis in my right eye and 3 thoracic spinal lesions. The only new lesion I got in the next 14 years was in my cervical spine. I was doing great on my avonex until my Neuro said he wasn't going to give me, because I had devic's not MS. (long story short) So I went to see the head of DUKE neuro who told me I didn't have MS, though I should get MRI's every year. My brain was clear until 2011 when I got 10 lesions and my Dr. put me on Tysabri. So 14 years later I HAVE MS. I think every one is different and so are a lot of the Neurologist. Hang in there and find a Dr. you trust.
I thought I was crazy for years...
Jenna

Pretty sure I read somewhere that MS lesions can appear anywhere there is brain matter. The spinal cord and the optic nerve are considered brain matter.

Sam, I heard differing stories when I was going more often to neurologists. Some said that MS usually clustered lesions around the "ventricals", in a certain part of the brain. Others said that lesions could be anywhere in the brain. And then some people I knew in support groups then, who had diagnoses of MS, had lesions only in their spines. The ones with the spinal lesions said they thought they could "think more clearly" than the brain lesion people, and a social worker talking to the group said that could be true, but all MS people she had met had "loss of executive function". That sorta means you can't file things well, organize as well, and remember several things at once. I never had a spinal MRI because lesions showed in my brain. They were not periventricular so some neuros suspected them of not being real MS. They were more on the sides of my head in the temporal areas, first coming forth on the left, then on the right.

Maybe the neuro thought you recently had a brain MRI so the spinal one "covered the waterfront."

I went to a neuro my parents sent me to, at a teaching hospital, when I was your age, and he said I didn't have MS. (no MRI in those days).
Later when my eyes got worse, a lot worse, I got an MRI and VER, and they were positive. But that was decades later. Sometimes it just is a long thing. Please read Dr. Swank's book and other information and keep learning, as it may be something to live with for a while.