{"id":5277,"date":"2006-04-21T11:22:33","date_gmt":"2006-04-21T15:22:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/formerlyknownas\/2006\/04\/21\/cfs-genes-and-stress-so-thats"},"modified":"2011-08-05T14:53:59","modified_gmt":"2011-08-05T18:53:59","slug":"cfs-genes-and-stress-so-thats-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/2006\/04\/21\/cfs-genes-and-stress-so-thats-why\/","title":{"rendered":"cfs, genes and stress: so that’s why!"},"content":{"rendered":"

O<\/strong><\/em>ne of the worst things about having the medical diagnosis (<\/span>as I do<\/span><\/a>)<\/span> of “Chronic Fatigue Syndrome<\/span><\/a>” is not being able to point to specific,<\/span> scientific\/medical causes for the myriad symptoms.\u00a0 Because you<\/span> do not “look sick” and can’t “prove” how worn out your body seems<\/span> or how much pain you’re feeling, many of the people in your life —<\/span> including some doctors — start thinking you are “crazy or lazy,” which<\/span> can affect your own self-image.<\/p>\n

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\"computer<\/span> One thing that “makes no sense” to many of my friends and often<\/span> to myself, is my felt experience over the past decade that mental <\/span>and<\/span> emotional stressors, and exposure to virtually anyone’s germs,\u00a0can<\/span> be as debilitating as physical <\/span>exertion or injury for me.\u00a0 It is with some<\/span> relief, therefore, that I read <\/span>the article “Chronic Fatigue’s Genetic Component<\/a>: <\/span>Study Clarifies <\/span>Predisposition to Syndrome,”\u00a0this morning’s Washington<\/em><\/span> Post <\/em>(April <\/span>21, 2006), which summarizes\u00a0“The results, published in more<\/span> than a <\/span>dozen reports and commentaries in the April issue of the journal <\/span>Pharmacogenomics<\/em><\/span> [http:\/\/www.nature.com\/tpj\/index.html]<\/em>. <\/span><\/div>\n
. .<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
The article states, in part (emphasis added):<\/span><\/div>\n
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“An intense battery of medical and psychological tests of people<\/span><\/span> with chronic fatigue syndrome has strengthened the idea that<\/span><\/span> the mysterious ailment is actually a collection of five or more<\/span><\/span> conditions with varying genetic and environmental causes,<\/span><\/span> scientists reported yesterday.<\/div>\n
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\"graphClimbN\"<\/span> “But though the syndrome comes in many flavors, these experts<\/span><\/span> said, the new work also points to an important common feature:<\/span><\/span> The brains and immune systems of affected people do not respond<\/em><\/span><\/span> normally to physical and psychological stresses<\/em>.”<\/div>\n
. . .<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
” . . . in one analysis, the activity of just 26 genes did accurately<\/span><\/span> predict which of six categories of chronic fatigue a patient had on<\/span><\/span> the basis of symptoms and other clinical tests. That is a powerful<\/span><\/span> hint that those genes — many of them involved in immune system<\/span><\/span> regulation, the adrenal gland and the brain’s hypothalamus and<\/span><\/span> pituitary gland, which are involved in the body’s response to stress —<\/span><\/span> may hold clues to the disease variants.<\/div>\n
. . .<\/div>\n
” . . .\u00a0 It is already known, [CDC’s Suzzane D.] Vernon said, that<\/span><\/span> the brain can literally rewire itself — breaking old connections between<\/span><\/span> neurons while building new ones — in response to various physical or<\/span><\/span> emotional events. Chronic fatigue syndrome may be the result of a<\/span><\/span> <\/span><\/span>bad rewiring job, she said, in people genetically predisposed to handle stress poorly.” <\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
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“The specific implications remain uncertain for now, said<\/span><\/span><\/span> <\/span><\/span>Vernon, a CDC molecular biologist. “But everybody’s finding <\/span><\/span>the same five genes to be involved, which is pretty cool.”<\/div>\n
“Several other studies on the Wichita samples found abnormal<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/span> levels of various hormones relating to stress and mood —<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/span> additional evidence that chronic fatigue syndrome patients are<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/span> genetically and neurologically “wired” to respond to stress abnormally<\/em>.”<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n
If you think it’s strange to be thrilled finding out you may indeed have genetic abnor<\/span><\/span>malities, <\/span><\/span>you probably have not lived with the uncertainties of an illness like CFS.\u00a0 For<\/span><\/span> now, <\/span><\/span>I plan to chastise myself less when stressful topics (like here<\/a> yesterday) seem to<\/span><\/span> leave <\/span><\/span>me so drained.\u00a0 I will also keep in mind this crucial sentence\u00a0in the WaPo<\/em> article<\/a>:<\/div>\n
“The <\/span><\/span>researchers predicted that continued clarification of the precise genes and hormones<\/span><\/span> involved will lead to better diagnostic tests and therapies for the ailment, which may <\/span><\/span>affect <\/span><\/span> close to 1 million Americans.”<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
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. . .<\/div>\n
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mom’s arthritis
\nacting up —
\nI take two Advil<\/div>\n
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her beer breath —
\ntonight,
\nwe both have headaches<\/p>\n

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One of the worst things about having the medical diagnosis (as I do) of “Chronic Fatigue Syndrome” is not being able to point to specific, scientific\/medical causes for the myriad symptoms.\u00a0 Because you do not “look sick” and can’t “prove” how worn out your body seems or how much pain you’re feeling, many of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":94,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2926],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pre-06-2006"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kP1R-1n7","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/94"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5277"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5277\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12679,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5277\/revisions\/12679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}