Individuals in New York who have a disease called MELAS might be interested to learn that the Chinese Medical Journal has published a study that looks at the current methods of diagnosing the disease. MELAS is a mitochondrial disease, which tends to be rare, but among mitochondrial diseases, it is one of the more common ones. Because symptoms can vary from person to person, it is also frequently misdiagnosed. The prognosis for a patient with MELAS improves with an early diagnosis.