A persistent advocate for improved MS treatment:
Kerri Cassidy

A persistent advocate for improved MS treatment:
Kerri Cassidy

ABC NEWS: NORMAN HERMANT

Making a difference in the lives of people with a disability has been a relentless focus for the last six years for Kerri Cassidy.

The award finalist is one of the world's leading advocates for a treatment that dramatically improved her life with multiple sclerosis (MS).

"It's actually been left up to us to prove that this is helping us," said Ms Cassidy, referring to Chronic Cerebro Spinal Veneous Insufficiency, or CCSVI.

It is an angioplasty treatment, where tiny balloons are inserted in veins and inflated to clear blockages.

It had an enormous impact on Ms Cassidy's condition. She had been experiencing involuntary muscle twitches and her mobility was rapidly declining. Those symptoms disappeared after her CCSVI treatment.

"The major veins that drain the brain, if they're blocked, we're asking for angioplasty treatment, just to see if it works," she said.

Angioplasty for MS patients is not funded by Medicare. Ms Cassidy was instrumental in launching a medical trial to prove the treatments' effectiveness.

She has helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars, and thousands of online followers around the world watch her YouTube videos.

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