UAMS Brings Together Patients, Caregivers and Providers for First MS Symposium

By Yavonda Chase

The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) hosted its first Multiple Sclerosis Symposium on March 15, bringing together patients, caregivers and health care professionals to discuss the oft-debilitating neurological disease.

For co-organizer Ashley Pike, Ph.D., a postdoctoral fellow in the UAMS Helen L. Porter and James T. Dyke Brain Imaging Research Center, the event was personal; in 2008, she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, often called MS.

A native Nebraskan who moved to Arkansas to attend graduate school, Pike said she discovered many people who are living with MS don’t know what resources are available to assist them, which is why she and Chrystal Fullen, Psy.D., a neuropsychologist in the UAMS Psychiatric Research Institute, worked with the Department of Neurology to put on the symposium.

UAMS Brings Together Patients, Caregivers and Providers for First MS Symposium

Lizzy East Couch and her husband, Patrick (left), share a laugh with UAMS neurologist R. Lee Archer, M.D., before the start of the symposium. Image by Tim Taylor