Marvel’s Spider-Man games assigned a real-life genetic illness to Harry Osborn and his deceased mother Emily. Or they sort of did. It’s complicated, okay? I’ve gone down an absolute rabbit hole trying to find out exactly what happened here.

Jump back in time with me to 2018’s Spider-Man. During the “Step Into My Parlor” mission, you can find a letter explaining exactly what Emily Osborn’s condition is called and what doctors are doing for her. Here it is:

January 23, 1997
Alchemax Medical Research 2246 Progress Way New York, NY 10001
To Whom It May Concern:
I am writing on behalf of my patient, Emily Osborn, to document the medical necessity of your experimental immunoglobulin therapy, RM-237, for the treatment of vasculitis associated with Oshtoran syndrome. This letter provides information about the patient’s medical history, diagnosis, and a statomont summarizing my treatment rationale.
Patient’s History and Diagnosis:
Mrs. Osborn was first diagnosed with Oshtoran syndrome in 1984 following a series of unexplained medical incidents. Initially, systemic lupus erythematosus was suspected, but after careful diagnostic exclusion this along with many other possibilities was ruled out. This diagnosis has been confirmed by multiple physicians of various specializations throughout the country.
Treatment Rationale:
Since diagnosis, a team of physicians based in New York, Tel Aviv, Birnin Zana and Seoul has been treating Mrs. Osborn with a combination of medications, physical therapy, and a strict nutritional plan. Because many aspects of Oshtoran syndrome are not yet understood, newly developed and experimental treatments have also been employed at the insistence of Mrs. Osborn and her husband. Previously, the patient’s vasculitis has been treated with immune suppression drugs, but recent debilitating infections have encouraged us to try RM-237.
Duration:
Mrs. Osborn will be placed on an initial 6-week regime to judge the effectiveness of RM-237 in treating her symptoms. Following that period, I and her other physicians will decide whether continued use will be medically advantageous and necessary.”
Summary:
In summary, RM-237 is medically necessary for this patient’s medical condition. Please contact me if any additional information is required to ensure the prompt approval of the therapy.
Sincerely,
Dr. Morgan Michaels

Spider-Man fans will recognize “Alchemax,” and “Dr Morgan Michaels” there. “RM-237” is more mysterious. I googled it and it doesn’t appear to be a real thing, so presumably that’s the treatment derived from the Venom symbiote in-game.

But “Oshtoran Syndrome” does exist… maybe?? Googling it gives you some weird and wonderful results about whether it exists or not.

For a start, there’s this blog post from someone who’s actually educated on the subject. They do a deep dive into whether the syndrome exists or not and conclude, “hell if I know.”

If you search for a list of autoimmune diseases online, you’ll likely land on a Wikipedia page with a list of many known autoimmune diseases. One of the diseases in the list is called Oshtoran syndrome. I had never heard of it before today. Sounds like a species of alien from Doctor Who. It sits between Multiple Sclerosis and Progressive inflammatory neuropathy. Suitably so.

[…]

I am not sure what to make of this ‘syndrome’, but it is safe to say this: I had a simple task this morning: create a group of autoimmune MEDDRA keywords for a search and subsequent analysis of VAERS. I used the Wikipedia list. I found one entry that had been removed. I thought it odd and had never heard of it, so I searched for information on it. It led me to a syndrome (which is just a vague description of a bunch of symptoms) that is a neuro-degenerative disorder that involves glutamine and kynurenine alteration.

Another weird factoid on this Oshtoran syndrome. It is this very condition that a character in the Spider Man comics is meant to have (as well as his mother – she died from it) and he ends up being put in suspended animation to await a cure for it.

(though Harry has a neuro-degenerative condition only in the game and Amazing Spider-Man 2, not the comics.)

So I wonder what happened here. Maybe the game writers simply ran down the Wikipedia list and picked a condition without checking whether its existence was disputed or not?

However the symptoms of Oshtoran Syndrome are listed here as: “cognitive functioning, psychiatric health, movement control, liver (fatty infiltration, hyperplastic nodules), fat metabolism, abnormal adrenal gland functioning and other issues which are caused by disturbed signalling functions in the nervous and other systems due to functional changes in a part of the immune system connected to a kynurenine pathway dysfunction.” A lack of movement control could be why Harry requires a cane after the disease comes back in the second half of Spider-Man 2.

The blog post notes, “It is pretty easy to confuse this syndrome with other conditions like SLE, liver diseases, schizophrenia, dementia and many more diseases related to autoimmune conditions that affect many organ and organ systems with the most prevalent being the brain.” Schizophrenia is the condition Harry’s had in the comics since 1973.

(At the time, it was said to have been caused by his using LSD. Stan Lee and co. weren’t doing a huge amount of research at the time but some googling indicates that yes, LSD can trigger schizophrenia, or make it worse.)

So perhaps the game writers were aiming for a genetic disease that had some of the same symptoms of schizophrenia but could also lead to physical disability and death, and thus stumbled onto Oshtoran syndrome? I’d love to pick their brains about it. But in the meantime: Oshtoran syndrome probably isn’t something you need to worry about…

…however, there are some syndromes very similar to what Oshtoran Syndrome is described as. Just because that particular diagnosis doesn’t seem to truly exist doesn’t mean the symptoms don’t, you know?

Looking all this up was a rollercoaster ride for me because, just like Harry, my mother has a serious autoimmune/neuro-degenerative disease, Multiple Sclerosis, and frankly, no-one has ever seemed particularly sure if it’s genetic or not. (Hooray.) So if any of this interested you, why not donate some money to MS research? There is no Emily-May Foundation in real life but there are, luckily, a few similar things.