Woman finds hope in new MS treatment

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WVIR) - A woman with multiple sclerosis has hope for the future.

She recently tried a new FDA-approved MS drug at UVA Hospital that takes far less time than other treatments.

“I could not walk, and it was very painful,” Wanda Lee-Ballou said.

Her life changed a week before her 40th birthday. Lee-Ballou’s neurologist diagnosed her with multiple sclerosis.

“He told me that I had lesions on my brain and C-spine, and told me that, yeah, that I had MS,” she said.

Lee-Ballou was working at a daycare at the time. But after her diagnosis, she stopped working for five years.

After rounds of IVs and injections, she became a bus driver for Campbell County.

“I have never claimed MS, so I don’t let it stop me,” Lee-Ballou said.

As new treatments came along Lee-Ballou found more hope in a drug called Ocrevus, which takes just a two- to three-hour treatment.

But that all ended with the recent IV shortage and her insurance company denying coverage.

That’s when Genentech, the company that makes Ocrevus, stepped in and paid for Lee-Ballou’s new treatment Ocrevus Zenovo.

“We were at a roadblock,” Lee-Ballou said. “We just went with the Ocrevus Zenovo.”

The new FDA-approved drug takes less than 30 minutes and is needed twice a year.

Lee-Ballou says so far no side effects.

“I will continue to progress and continue to live and do the things that I have been doing in the past,” Lee-Ballou said.

With support from her doctor, students, family, and husband, Lee-Ballou finds the motivation to keep going.

“I don’t stop. I keep going. I’m that energizer bunny,” Ballou said

UVA neurologist doctor Robert Shin says this drug has the potential to be life-changing.

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