Covid-19 and people with neuromuscular disorders

28 March 2020

The World Muscle Society Position and Advice for managing COVID-19 in people affected by neuromuscular conditions

Dr. Maxwell Damian together with more than 80 specialists in the field collated the WMS Covid-19 advice for neuromuscular patients, carers, general neurologists and non-specialist medical providers. This advice is also intended to inform neuromuscular specialists particularly regarding frequently asked questions and basic service requirements. 

The latest version (April 23, 2022) of the WMS position on Covid-19 and its advice on Vaccines can be downloaded here below respectively: 

History of versions:

Version 1 – WMS Covid-19 advice 28-03-2020

Version 2 – Update 02-04-2020

Version 3 – Update 20-04-2020

Version 4 – Update and Deconfinement 10-05-2020

Version 5 – WMS vaccines document 28-02-2021

WMS COVID-19 advice (updated 23-04-22)

WMS vaccines and therapeutics (23-04-2022)

The advice is endorsed by the Members of the Board of the WMS (www.worldmusclesociety.org), colleagues from the Editorial Board of Neuromuscular Disorders, the official journal of the WMS, EAN Scientific Panel Muscle & NMJ disorders, ERN EURO-NMD, Treat-NMD and ENMC.

Translations:

Arabic by Rasha el Sherif
Czech by Jana Haberlova
Chinese (Traditional) by Wen-Chen Liang
Dutch by Peter van den Bergh and Nathalie Goemans
French by Shahram Attarian
German by Benedikt Schoser (here also the link to the: Nichtinvasive Heimbeatmung NME Deutsch WMS recommendation + COVID-19 WMS Empfehlungen Update 10-MAY-2020 and the WMS Empfehlung Corona-Impfstoffe 23-12-2020, WMS-COVID19 Vaccine Impfempfehlungen 28Februar2021)
Hungarian by Rita Horvath
Indonesian Luh Ari Indrawati
Italian by Antonio Toscano (here also the link to the: 27-04-2020 WMS Covid-19 document Updated Italian version)
Japanese by Madoka Mori-Yoshimura, Wakako Yoshioka, Ichizo Nishino
Korean by Jongmok Lee
Malay by Khean-Jin  Goh
Polish by Anna Kostera-Pruszczyk
Portuguese by Teresina Evangelista
Portugese (Brazil) by Mariz Vainzof (here also the link to the: WMS vaccines document Portugues -final)
Spanish by Montse Olivé
Swedish by Mar Tulinius and Anders Oldfors
Turkish by Haluk Topaloglu

For new updates and amendments of the Covid-19 advice and subsequent translations; click here

Also please see a directory of guidelines / information resources relating to neurological disorders as posted on the EPNS website. There is useful information also for NMD patients.

COVID-19

From Joshua Benditt MD, Medical Director of Respiratory Care Services and General Pulmonary Clinic in Seattle, USA, we received a COVID-19 Plan and Preparation Guide for Adults with NMD put out by one of the NMD United patient groups and designed for patients as to best practices to stay safe in the current situation.

 

For some of the sections, amendments were made: Update 02-04-2020 to WMS advice Covid-19.

ENMC White Paper

On Rare Disease Day 2020, the outcomes and consensus from the ENMC workshop on “The position of the neuromuscular patient in shared decision making” are now published in a WhitePaper. The workshop participants represented a wide range of stakeholders from 15 different countries: patients and parents, representatives from neuromuscular diseases organisations, clinicians, health care professionals, researchers, societal and policy researchers, psychologists, ethicists, representatives from regulatory authorities and pharmaceutical companies. The White Paper is based on the outcome of the workgroup discussions (published by Lochmuller et al, 2019 and Ambrosini et al, 2019) and, in particular, it reports the consensus reached on specific recommendations for patient organizations and health care professionals, together with key examples analysed during the meeting.

It is a call to action to all stakeholders to become ambassadors and promote the direct involvement of people living with a neuromuscular disease in all aspects of health care and medicine development related to their disease. 

The workshop took place in Milan, Italy in 2018 and was attended by 45 participants from 15 different countries.

 

The 2nd report of the special ENMC workshop on the role of the neuromuscular patient in Shared-Decision-Making!

 

Ambrosini et al. Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases (2019) 14:126

 

ENMC bibliometric report published

The CWTS bibliometric report on ENMC workshop derived publications is now available.

Publication on the impact of 25 years ENMC workshops

Proud at our publication in Neuromuscular Disorders on “The impact of European Neuromuscular Centre (ENMC) workshops on the neuromuscular field; 25 years on …” by Alexandra Breukel et al.
Results from a bibliometric and quantitative analysis on workshop deliverables are shown in this publication.

Press release – ENMC publication about the role of patients in NMD research

Expand the role of patients, the true experts, in neuromuscular disease research, is the conclusion of this international ENMC workshop !

JND Press release February 2019

Lochmüller et al, full paper PDF of full paper

New ENMC Research Director !

Welcome to our new Research Director Dr Ana Ferreiro

Dr Ana Ferreiro, MD, PhD is the new ENMC Research Director as of January 1st 2019. We congratulate Ana on her new task within our organisation and look forward working with her.

Dr Ana Ferreiro is Research Director at the INSERM “Basic and Translational Myology” laboratory Unité de Biologie Fonctionnelle et Adaptative (BFA), Université Paris, France. She is also a consultant neurologist at one of the ERN centres: The Institut of Myology, Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital in Paris.

We will be working on themes like patient participation in ENMC activities and encouragement of young scientists to join the ENMC network. Ana will accompany the ENMC office at several international NMD meetings and at ENMC workshops to meet with you in person.

Announcement: As of 2018, ENMC relocated its workshop venue

ENMC organises its workshops at the venue of the new hotel:

Courtyard by Marriott Amsterdam Airport
Bosweg 15
2131 LX, Hoofddorp
The Netherlands

Phone: +31 23 556 9000

Read more