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Article History

Received: 13 November 2018

Accepted: 13 June 2019

First Online: 25 July 2019

Ethics approval and consent to participate

: Twenty-four patients were seen at four university tertiary care centers specialized in neuroimmunological diseases (Institute of clinical Neuroimmunology, Ludwig- Maximilians University (LMU), Munich, NeuroCure Clinical Research Center, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany; Department of Neurology, University of Lille Hospital, Lille, France; Department of Neurology, Klinikum Rechts der Isar, Technische Universität München (TUM), Munich, Germany). Written informed consent was obtained from all patients participating in the study. The local ethics committees approved the study protocol in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki (1964) in its currently applicable version.

: Not applicable

: JH reports a grant for OCT research from the Friedrich-Baur-Stiftung; personal fees and non-financial support from Merck, Novartis, Roche, Bayer Healthcare, Santhera, Biogen, Sanofi Genzyme; and non-financial support of the Guthy-Jackson Charitable Foundation, all outside the submitted work. FCO was an employee of Nocturne UG, unrelated to this work. OO reports grant for research from Novartis-Pharma and grants and personal fees from Biogen, Genzyme, Merck, Novartis-Pharma, and Teva-Pharma, outside the submitted work. BK reports grants from the Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (Kompetenznetz Multiple Sklerose KKNMS), intramural funding from the Technical University of Munich (KKF program) and a grant from Novartis unrelated to this study. HZ reports a research grant from Novartis related to this study and speaking fees from Teva unrelated to this study. LB has nothing to disclose. JBS has received travel grants and speaking fees from Bayer Healthcare, Biogen Idec, Merck Serono, Sanofi-Aventis/Genzyme, Teva Pharmaceuticals unrelated to this study. SJ has nothing to disclose. The Neurological Research Laboratory (Medical University of Innsbruck and Tirol Kliniken, MR) receives payments for antibody assays (AQP4- and anti-neuronal antibodies) and for AQP4- and MOG-antibody validation experiments organized by Euroimmun (Germany). KR was supported by the German Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF/KKNMS, Competence Network Multiple Sclerosis) and has received research support from Novartis and Merck Serono as well as speaking fees and travel grants from Guthy Jackson Charitable Foundation, Bayer Healthcare, Biogen Idec, Merck Serono, Sanofi-Aventis/Genzyme, Teva Pharmaceuticals, Roche and Novartis. EM received an honorarium from Roche, Novartis and Genzyme, and grant support from Novartis and Genzyme. RH received research grants and/or speaker honoraria from Actelion, Genzyme-Sanofi, Novartis, Immunic, Roche. FP reports research grants and speaker honoraria from Bayer, Teva, Genzyme, Merck, Novartis, MedImmune and is a member of the steering committee of the OCTIMS study (Novartis), all unrelated to this work. AUB is the founder and holds shares of Motognosis and Nocturne. He is named as an inventor on several patent applications describing serum biomarkers for MS, perceptive visual computing for tracking of motor dysfunction and OCT image analysis. TK received travel expenses and personal compensations from Bayer Healthcare, Teva Pharma, Merck, Novartis Pharma, Sanofi-Aventis/Genzyme, Roche, and Biogen as well as grant support from Bayer-Schering AG, Novartis and Chugai Pharma, unrelated to this work.