MS in adults is more common than MS in other age groups. That is why much online information about managing MS is geared towards addressing multiple sclerosis in adults.
The age group in which MS is most prevalent is that of adults of reproductive age, namely those between the ages of twenty years and forty years. These MS patients are also predominantly women. Thus, much of the material on the subject of multiple sclerosis tends to focus on the concerns or needs of this demographic. This is only to be expected. After all, many of the online MS resources are the fruit of the efforts of people living with MS. These people write predominantly about their personal experiences and about any official research or information pertaining to their condition. So it goes without saying that the experiences of the typical MS patient will be emphasized in the resources.
MS in Adults versus MS in Other Age Groups
There are older children and adolescents living with multiple sclerosis. There are also middle aged men and women who are in their fifties when they first develop MS symptoms or get diagnosed. These two groups constitute the minority, and their experiences are unique and distinct from those of MS patients aged twenty to forty-years old. For instance, the teenagers are at an emotionally vulnerable stage in their lives and tend to experience pressures that are unique to their age group. Hence, they are candidates for high stress levels. Additionally, older children and teenagers are still experiencing growth. Thus, their bodies are primed to construct new tissue and repair damaged tissue. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that, the younger MS patients are, the more likely it is for them to recover quickly from any tissue damage they suffer. This explains why younger MS patients tend to show quicker recovery from demyelination than older MS patients. MS in youths could therefore be argued to generally progress slower than MS in adults.
Middle-aged sufferers of multiple sclerosis are adults, just like those sufferers of MS who fall within the twenty to forty age group. However, they differ from them in at least one important sense. In the case of female patients, menopause distinguishes the two groups of women. Because hormonal levels are closely associated with the progression of multiple sclerosis, the experience of menopause is apt to have an important impact on the progression and presentation of multiple sclerosis in women patients. The progression of multiple sclerosis in adults can thus be said to be strongly influenced by the said adults’ hormonal levels.
