|
 Chronic
fatigue is a debated and often ignored medical condition. As it
sometimes was the case with postpartum depression, chronic fatigue is
often regarded with disdain as something that will eventually go away if
the patient will just be reasonable. Persistent patients are often
prescribed antidepressants or sleep aids. Clinical depression is rarely
the cause of CF/FM, rather it is the result of being exhausted and
ignored when explaining one’s symptoms. Some clinics/clinicians have
used amphetamines, prednisone, vitamin B-12 as well as hormones in
various combinations but with little long- term success.
Chronic
fatigue, and its later manifestation fibromyalgia, presents symptoms
similar to those of mononucleosis; yet few doctors bother to test
patients for the causative viruses, such as Epstein-Barr (EBV), CMV, CSB,
and HSV-6. Most patients with CF/FM, but not all of them, have a
history of mononucleosis. In pre-pubescent patients mononucleosis is
frequently viewed and interpreted as a severe infection, flue-like in
its symptoms yet lasting a few weeks and is not checked for the above
viruses.
 CF/FM is
a complex set of physiological responses which may vary from patient to
patient; they may include metabolic and/or hormonal imbalances, an
immunological (B-cell/T-cell) imbalance, and parasitic or other
microbial infections. However, this illness usually has at its center a
persistent viral infection, often a remnant of an earlier mononucleosis
episode. Treatment of the peripheral symptoms without regard to the
viral component is usually ineffective or offers only a short time
reprise from CF/FM.
Viral
screening by blood procedures must measure the viral load or viral
titer; it must measure how many active viral particles are in the
blood. Viral exposure (antigen) tests do not measure the current status
but rather some past event. Many people have been exposed to the
Epstein-Barr virus, but only a few display symptoms of CF/FM. Those who
do almost always have high levels of circulating virus particles. While
current scientific thinking dictates that a virus can never be truly
eradicated from the human body, this does not imply that the viral load
cannot be reduced to levels which do not produce the symptoms of CF/FM.
Here at
the Immune Recovery Centers of America we believe that to successfully
treat CF/FM one must evaluate all of the potential determinants and
establish which ones are truly contributing to the cause and which are
merely results of the chronic disease. This does not mean that some can
be disregarded and will automatically resolve themselves over time after
treating the causes. While this may be true, patients have already
waited too long. Therefore, treating, for example, a thyroid imbalance
to achieve a faster return to good health l is better than waiting for
that component to auto-correct. The key is not to continue treating a
condition after it has corrected, but to monitor and treat the true
causes of CF/FM when they appear to be returning.
Our
centers offer a diagnostic and treatment program for CF/FM which
attempts to determine and treat the underlying causes, moderate the
non-causative symptoms, and design a maintenance program to keep these
symptoms under control. We also try to establish an “early warning
system,” which allows the patient to be aware of that a correction is
needed before the symptoms return. |
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