Oxford physician Thomas Willis recognised Myasthenia Gravis and wrote about it in Latin

The majority of the information in this timeline comes from A History of Treatment for Myasthenia Gravis by John Carl Keesey

Samuel Wilks gave the first modern description of MG

Wilhelm Erb, a professor at Heidelberg, was the first doctor to try treating the condition. He used quinine and a type of electrical therapy called galvani.

He used quinine and a type of electrical therapy called galvani.

Samuel Goldflam, a Polish physician, wrote that MG was an 'apparently curable bulbar paralytic symptom complex'

Harry Campbell and Edwin Bramwell collected 60 cases of MG from the literature, but it remained a mystery.

They stressed rest, avoidance of muscle fatigue, excitement and cold.

Berlin's Hermann Oppenheim suggested that electrical treatments should not be used.

He prescribed rest and trying to avoid muscle fatigue.

German surgeon partially removed the thymus in a young woman with MG to treat her hyperthyroidism.

Her MG improved but not her thyroidism

The treatment for MG was described as 'a source of discouragement to the patient and a cause of nightmare for the physician'.

Neostigmine became the drug of choice for treating MG

It was eventually discarded because of the toxic effects

Thymectomies were used as treatment before it was understood fully what the function of the thymus is

Mestinon,pyridostigamine bromide, was first synthesized in Basle, Switzerland.

It was tried unsuccessfully first in 1948 but it was later found to be less toxic and have better results than previous treatments

Simpson proposed that myasthenia gravis was caused by antibodies against the acetylcholine receptor

Aziathioprine tested in Europe as immunosuppressant for MG in Belgium

An 'improvement of varying intensity' lasting several weeks was reported

The first time treatment of MG with prednisolone was reported

This was done in Arhus, Denmark, and began in 1965