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MOG Antibody Disease Awareness Month Rock Your Shades Challenge

The entire month of April 2022!

Rock Your Shades: Hummingbird wearing glasses over a colorful background

Join the Challenge for MOG Awareness Month this April 2022!

This April, in partnership with The Siegel Rare Neuroimmune Association (SRNA), The Sumaira FoundationThe Guthy-Jackson Charitable Foundation and MyMyelitis, The MOG Project will launch the first-ever MOG Awareness Month, meant to bring awareness to and encourage people to get tested for MOG-AD. The MOG Project invites you to participate in the “Eyes on MOG” social media photo challenge to be shared on personal and professional accounts as users deem appropriate.

A key symptom of MOG-AD is optic neuritis, a condition that affects the eyes and vision. To show your support of those living with and affected by MOG-AD, post a photo of you and/or your family/friends rocking your favorite pair of sunglasses and keep up the “MOGmentum” by tagging your friends to do the same. To make participation as simple as possible, see the below guides to posting on Facebook and Instagram, suggested caption language and relevant hashtags to post. The MOG Project will be posting on Facebook and Instagram, but we invite you to post on any platform of your choice and encourage you to share to your story on any platform. We’ve included a MOG Awareness Month sticker that can be used on your story post, please see resources below to incorporate the sticker.

The MOG Project would not be what it is today without our growing network and support system. We truly value each and every one of you. Thank you for your support and we sincerely hope you will join us on social media to kick off the first ever MOG Awareness Month in April.

It's easy to do! Here's what you need:

Create your photo like one of these below. Be creative!

Couple together hugging and wearing sunglasses
Girl with shades looking over a beautiful view with mountains in the background

Pick your social media platform and use one of the appropriate captions below.
Don't forget to tag three friends!

I’ve got my eyes on MOG and this April, I want you to rock your shades for MOG Awareness Month! MOG-AD is a rare neuroimmune disorder that can attack the eyes, spinal cord and brain. To learn more visit: https://mogproject.org/2022/04/mog-awareness-month-is-april-2022/.

Copy this caption, tagging 3 of your friends, post a picture of you rocking your shades and include it to spread the word and keep up the MOGmentum! [Tag friend] [Tag friend] [Tag friend], show me your shades!

#MOGawarenessmonth #MOGmentum #raredisease #nonprofits #MOGAD #MOG

I’ve got my eyes on MOG and this April, I want you to rock your shades for MOG Awareness Month! MOG-AD is a rare neuroimmune disorder that can attack the eyes, spinal cord and brain. To learn visit our bio. Copy this caption, tagging 3 of your friends, post a picture of you rocking your shades and include it to spread the word and keep up the MOGmentum! [Tag friend] [Tag friend] [Tag friend], show me your shades!

#MOGawarenessmonth #MOGmentum #raredisease #nonprofits #MOGAD #MOG

Get Fancy! Share your post to your story and add our sticker to make it awesome. Just save the sticker to your phone by clicking the button below, go on instagram or Facebook and use the sticker when creating your story. There is an option to add stickers - one of those is an image from your photo library where you will have this sticker.

Massachusetts General Hospital
Harvard University

Michael Levy, MD, PhD

Dr. Levy is an Associate Professor in Neurology who was recently recruited to lead the new Neuroimmunology Division at the Massachusetts General Hospital. His mission is to build a combined clinical and research neuroimmunology program to develop therapies for patients with autoimmune diseases of the central nervous system. Dr. Levy moved from Baltimore, MD, where he was one of the faculty at Johns Hopkins University since 2009 and Director of the Neuromyelitis Optica Clinic.

Clinically, Dr. Levy specializes in taking care of children and adults with rare neuroimmunological diseases including neuromyelitis optica, transverse myelitis, MOG antibody disease and acute disseminated encephalomyelitis. In addition to four monthly clinics, Dr. Levy is the principal investigator on several clinical studies and drug trials for these conditions.

In the laboratory, Dr. Levy’s research focuses on four main areas:
1. Development of animal models of neuromyelitis optica (NMO) with the goal of tolerization as a sustainable long term treatment: His team generated a mouse model of NMO based on pathogenic T cells reactive against the aquaporin-4 water channel. Now, they are using this mouse model to create a tolerization therapy to desensitize the immune response to aquaporin-4.
2. Genetic basis of transverse myelitis: His team discovered a genetic mutation in VPS37a found in a group of patients with a familial form of transverse myelitis (TM). To understand how this gene is involved in this immune process, they generated a mouse model with this mutation.
3. The immunopathogenesis of MOG antibody disease: This may depend on a subset of T cells called gamma/delta T cells. These specialize T cells react to MOG in mouse models and attack the central nervous system. In addition to understanding why and how these T cells are involved in MOG antibody disease, they are developing a treatment to target these cells.
4. Biomarker assays for other autoimmune diseases of the central nervous system: They are developing assays that detect autoreactive T cells in NMO and MOG antibody disease. In parallel, they are screening for novel antibodies to glial cells in related disorders such as encephalitis and optic neuritis.