Hi Regina, NMO is often referred to as Devic's Disease. It is extremely rare, though in the last years I have heard that the number of documented cases has climbed to around 1000-1500 here in the States. LETM lesions are : Long extensive transverse myelitis, usually covering at least three segments of cord, and often more. At this time, NMO is incurable, and for a lot of relapsing patients, like myself, the prognosis is poor. We incur our damage during the acute attack. Our lesions are different in that they are often necrotic (Tissue death.) with cavitations. In our variety of optic neuritis, there is also axon death in the optic nerve. The Mayo Clinic was the very first facility to devise a test for this disease, discovering that unlike MS or Transverse Myelitis, the disease is antibody dependent. The sad thing is that neuros as a whole, are so unfamiliar with it and often misdiagnose it as MS, meaning that the patient is deprived of the appropriate treatment, often with catastrophic results. Currently, I am undergoing Rituxan infusions. It has had some promising results in the initial clinical trials for NMO, and the trials are still going on. Whenever my oral drugs stopped working, my neuro decided that it was my best shot at lengthening the amount of time between attacks and also making them more manageable wheneverthey do occur. Hope this helps.
Grace
