Aberdeen student creates comic to highlight hidden MS symptoms
The 27-year-old student said she wanted to create something engaging and to present information about the condition in an "approachable way". She said: "MS is a topic that is quite close to my heart, because my dad has it. He was diagnosed back in 2011. "It is something I've grown up around and I'm very used to. "I feel like there is quite a lot of stigma with MS, so I wanted to visualise the symptoms through a comic using things like visual metaphors."Invisible symptoms of MS are things that people struggle with but are not immediately apparent to others. These include pain, fatigue, brain fog, bladder and bowel difficulties, dizziness and mental health challenges.
The story follows two friends - one who has MS and one who does not. "The friend who doesn't have it struggles to understand it," Claire explains. "So they go on a journey to interact with different hidden symptoms along the way and gain a better understanding of what it can be like to live with these hidden symptoms."The artwork was created by Cat Laird and Ashling Larkin, while a team of experts were also involved in making the story to ensure the detail about living with MS was accurate.
MS advice 'more approachable'
Claire hopes presenting the information through a comic can make understanding it "less scary". She added: "It is more approachable to read health information when there is this kind of interplay between the text and the image. "With the comic it is just trying to get people thinking about health information and engaging with it when you are maybe not looking for it."The story can be found on the MS Trust website.It is hoped a wider physical run will be produced soon.
The MS Trust said the comic could help raise awareness about the "less obvious symptoms" and "improve knowledge" about MS."With invisible symptoms, there's a lot of stigma that can come with them, especially from people who don't have an understanding of MS," it said."There can be a lot of misunderstanding surrounding hidden symptoms and a lack of awareness of the difficulties that individuals with MS can face daily."
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