?Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry.
Devic’s syndrome was first described in 1870 by Sir Thomas Allbutt (what a name to have had as a kid!) who pointed out an association between myelitis and optic nerve disorder.? In 1894, Eugene Devic and his student Fernand Gault described 16 patients who had lost vision in one or both eyes and developed spastic weakness, sensory loss, and incontinence.? The other name of the condition was neuromyelitis optica (NMO). A major breakthrough came in 2004 when a specific marker NMO-IgG was found for the disorder [1].? IgG stands for immunoglobulin (a kind of antibody).
We identified the autoantibody against phosphoglycerate mutase 1 (PGAM1), which is a glycolytic enzyme, in sera from multiple sclerosis (MS) patients by proteomics-based analysis. We further searched this autoantibody in sera from patients with other neurological diseases. The prevalence of the anti-PGAM1 antibody is much higher in patients with MS and neuromyelitis optica (NMO) than in those with other neurological diseases and in healthy controls.