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Introduction: The prevalence of multiple sclerosis (MS) depends, among other factors, on its incidence and patients' survival time. It is not expected to be static over time. The purpose of this study was to calculate the prevalence of MS in Denmark in the period 1950-1996 and its prevalence in Danish counties in 1996. Materials and methods: The Danish Multiple Sclerosis Registry includes data on all Danes diagnosed with MS since 1921 who were alive in 1948, or who were diagnosed in the period 1949-1996. Our study included 13,144 patients with a validated MS diagnosis, 5,383 men and 7,761 women. The disease prevalence was calculated for each year from 1950 to 1996. For all counties and the municipalities of Copenhagen and Frederiksberg, the prevalence on 1 January 1996 was calculated. Results: In the observation period, the number of diagnosed MS patients increased from 2,387 to 6,445. The increase for women was from 1,353 to 4,122 and for men from 1,034 to 2,323. The prevalence rate per 100,000 population increased from 62.9 to 154.8 for women, from 48.8 to 89.4 for men and for both sexes from 55.9 to 122.5. The percentage of patients who were 60 years old or over increased from 10% to 33% during the observation period. No pattern in the geographic distribution of the prevalence was found. Discussion: The study confirmed that the prevalence of MS changes over time. Proportional to the population size, the prevalence more than doubled for men and increased by a factor of 2.5 for women during the observation period. The percentage of elderly MS patients increased significantly. The increase in prevalence reflects in part the increasing incidence of the disease and partly patients' longer survival time. Prevalence is a useful measure in connection with health economic calculations.

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