Treatments For Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Since researchers do not yet fully understand the cause of chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis and people with the illness can experience a wide variety of symptoms, multiple treatments exist. Treatments are aimed at managing and reducing the severity of CFS/ME symptoms, rather than at curing the illness.
Mental Health Support And Me/cfs
ME/CFS is not a psychological disorder. However, living with a chronic illness is challenging, especially one that involves missing out on normal life activities, and this may lead to mental health problems like anxiety or depression.
Speaking with a qualified mental health professional who understands the challenges of living with ME/CFS can be very helpful. They can help with things such as coping with changes to schooling, employment or social activities, and symptoms such as difficulty with sleep or pain. With the availability of Medicare rebates for telehealth, many mental health practitioners now offer remote consultations which makes healthcare more accessible for those who are housebound or bedbound with ME/CFS.
What Is Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Post Covid
Many COVID patients after recovery experience tiredness, muscle pain and tenderness, and a significant drop in energy. It is called chronic fatigue syndrome post COVID. The severity of COVID infection has an impact, as the severity of the syndrome is proportional to the severity of the infection, Dr. Gupta explained.
The symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome include:
- Pain in the muscles called myalgia
- Muscle tenderness
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Getting Older And Me/cfs
There is very little information on getting older and ME/CFS, however people can develop ME/CFS at any age. Additionally, all of the strategies such as pacing to reduce PEM and managing symptoms still apply. As people age, other problems with their health may also arise, so discussing any new symptoms with their doctor important.
How Is Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/chronic Fatigue Syndrome Diagnosed
Your doctor diagnoses ME/CFS by performing a mental and physical examination. Doctors will ask about your medical history and order blood and urine tests to check for infection. In many cases, doctors refer people with suspected ME/CFS to other specialists to rule out other illnesses that could be causing symptoms.
For your doctor to diagnose ME/CFS, you must have these 3 symptoms:
- Severe fatigue lasting at least 6 months that does not improve with rest or sleep
- Difficulty sleeping
- Fatigue that gets worse after mental or physical exercise
Additionally, you must have at least 1 of the following symptoms:
- Orthostatic intolerance
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Memory And Concentration Problems
Memory aids, like organizers and calendars, can help with memory problems. For people with ME/CFS who have concentration problems, some doctors have prescribed stimulant medications, like those typically used to treat Attention-Deficit / Hyperactivity Disorder . While stimulants might help improve concentration for some patients with ME/CFS, they might lead to the push-and-crash cycle and worsen symptoms. Push-and-crash cycles are when someone with ME/CFS is having a good day and tries to push to do more than they would normally attempt .
What Is The Best Way To Fight Fatigue 14 Tips
Fatigue is often caused by poor diet, lack of sleep, and unhealthy habits. The best way to fight fatigue is to eat healthy, get adequate sleep, and make lifestyle changes that help keep your energy levels up.
Here are 14 ways to combat fatigue and boost your energy throughout the day.
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is a chronic illness characterized by extreme fatigue that lasts for more than six months. This fatigue cannot be explained away by an underlying medical condition. In fact, one of the diseases principle challenges is that its impossible to diagnose with laboratory tests. However, some professionals believe it is closely related to adrenal fatigue or system wide inflammation of the body.
The process for diagnosis usually begins with ruling out possible underlying diseases and chronic conditions until the only choice left is chronic fatigue syndrome. Left untreated, it decreases stamina, memory and concentration.
Chronic fatigue syndrome can result in strained relationships with friends and family, especially when it remain undiagnosed and/or untreated. Guilt, anxiety and anger are all common emotional responses for those fighting chronic fatigue.
Currently, over 1 million Americans are suffering from this debilitating illness that manifests with a lack of energy and motivation, and women are 24 times more likely than men to be diagnosed.
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Tips For Exercising Safely With Me/cfs
If you feel you can tolerate some exercise, be guided by your doctor or specialist, but general suggestions include:
- Experiment to find the type of exercise that works best for you. Choose from a range of gentle activities such as stretching, yoga, tai chi, walking and light weight training. Often, people find exercises lying down use less energy.
- Keep an activity diary so you have a long-term picture of your performance levels and factors that might impact on your symptoms. Some people with ME/CFS find they feel good straight after exercise, but then crash later on, so make sure you monitor how you feel, hours to days after exercise.
- Stop the physical activity well before you feel any symptom flare. Pacing yourself is very important.
- Remember that the amount of exercise you can do will change from one day to the next.
- Listen to your body if you dont feel up to exercising on a particular day, dont.
- Find out as much as you can about your ME/CFS. Make sure you consult with health professionals who fully understand ME/CFS as a biomedical disease
Get 7 9 Hours Of Sleep Nightly
The National Sleep Foundation recommends adults get seven to nine hours of sleep per night. Some questions you can ask yourself to see if you are not sleeping enough include: Does it take me a long time to fall asleep? Do I wake up often or am I restless? Do I feel sleepy when driving? Do I need caffeine to get through the day? Answer, yes, to any of these indicates you may not be getting enough quality sleep.
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Managing Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Imagine not being able to get out of bed in the morning, despite getting a good nights sleep. Or suddenly experiencing such debilitating fatigue that you arent able to take part in everyday activities. These are common experiences of those with chronic fatigue syndrome, a condition that affects up to 2.5 million people in the United States. Among those, at least twice as many women suffer from chronic fatigue than men.
Despite its prevalence and its debilitating nature, chronic fatigue syndrome wasnt a recognized medical condition until the late 1980s. Even today, as symptoms can resemble a variety of other illnesses, getting a definitive diagnosis can be challenging. One survey of 282 emergency room patients found that 42% of those with chronic fatigue syndrome reported being dismissed by doctors as having psychosomatic complaints. Fortunately, ongoing research is contributing to a greater understanding among both health care providers and patients.
Did you know? Approximately 90% of people with chronic fatigue syndrome have not been diagnosed.
Causes Of Extreme Fatigue
Many people struggle with fatigue, which has many causes some obvious, others not so much. Causes of chronic fatigue include poor quality or not enough sleep, a bad diet, not exercising, and metabolic and hormonal imbalances. It becomes a vicious cycle when fatigue sets in and worsens your fatigue.
But you can manage your fatigue when you first figure out the root causeor causes of feeling tired all the time. Some reasons why you might feel extreme fatigue include:
- Adrenal burnout
- Toxicity including things like environmental pollutants, but also less-obvious toxins, including mold, mercury from amalgams, and electromagnetic fields from electronics.
This list goes on, and oftentimes multiple factors create or worsen fatigue. On the other hand, chronic fatigue might result from one primary reason, like poor sleep, stress, a bad diet, or not getting the right nutrients. These five strategies may help you boost your energy.
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Your Chronic Fatigue Recovery Strategy: Get Started Now
First, in spite of what you may have been told before, know this:
- There is an explanation for your suffering.
- There is absolutely a treatment program that will work for you.
Second, distinguish those aspects of your chronic fatigue syndrome recovery you will need professional help with from what you can begin to do yourself right now:
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Physical Or Emotional Trauma
Physical or emotional trauma hasalso been linked to CFS.
For example, people who have experienced a car accident or another type of traumatic event are more likely to develop CFS.
Additionally, people who were abused as children are also at a higher risk for CFS.
Its not clear how physical or emotional trauma might cause chronic fatigue syndrome. However, its possible that these events could trigger changes in the immune system or other biological processes.
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A Natural History Of Disease Framework For Improving The Prevention Management And Research On Post
- 1Faculty of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom
- 2UK Health Security Agency, London, United Kingdom
- 3B.C. Women’s Hospital and Health Centre, Vancouver, BC, Canada
- 4Pro-cardiaco Hospital and Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- 5Faculty of Epidemiology and Population Health, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom
Sleep Rest And Relaxation
You may have sleep problems that make your ME/CFS symptoms worse. For example, you may:
- have problems getting to sleep
- have unrefreshing or restless sleep
- need an excessive amount of sleep
- sleep during the day and be awake at night
You should be given advice about how to establish a normal sleeping pattern. Having too much sleep does not usually improve the symptoms of ME/CFS, and sleeping during the day can stop you sleeping at night.
You should change your sleep pattern gradually, and your doctor should review how its going regularly. If your sleep does not improve after making changes, you may have an underlying sleep problem that will need to be addressed.
Its likely youll need to rest during the day, and your doctor should advise you about the best way to do this. For example, they may suggest limiting each rest period to 30 minutes and teach you relaxation techniques, such as breathing exercises.
If you have severe ME/CFS and need to spend much of your time in bed, it can cause problems, including pressure sores and blood clots. These problems, and how to avoid them, should be explained to you and your carers.
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Symptoms Of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Doctors have narrowed down some of the triggers for chronic fatigue syndrome. Everyone is different, though, and may experience symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome differently, but theCenters for Disease Control and doctors classifychronic fatigue syndrome as having at least four of the following physical symptoms for at least six months:
- Post-exertional malaise
- Unrefreshing sleep
Chronic fatigue syndrome can only be diagnosed when other diseases have been ruled out, but thats the problem: You may experience fatigue as a symptom of other health conditions.
Foods Known To Dramatically Improve Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Chronic fatigue syndrome is characterized by extreme fatigue that does not let up with rest. The cause is unknown, though theories include hormonal imbalance, improper diet, physiological stress, viral infections, and thyroid problems. Symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome are memory loss, chronic fatigue, and disrupted sleep. Headaches, unexplained muscle pain, and viral infections are also associated with chronic fatigue syndrome. Many foods can serve as an alternative treatment to help reduce levels of exhaustion. Get to know the best ones for this now.
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Moving Beyond Diagnosis To Find The Causes
I learned firsthand the struggle to understand fatigue-related disorders when a personal encounter with debilitating fatigue around age 50 forced me to see them differently than most physicians. After years of intense night call as an OB/GYN and keeping some pretty poor health habits, I was gradually propelled into chronic misery and had to give up my practice as a result.
I experienced the full range of symptoms common to chronic fatigue syndrome. And like most sufferers, I struggled between a diagnosis of CFS and fibromyalgia, but ultimately chose fibromyalgia because of pain issues. Later, after a tick bite with a bulls eye rash, I concluded that I had been suffering from chronic Lyme disease all along.
Now, after more than a decade of research and trial and error with nearly every possible conventional and alternative treatment, Im finally well again. In the process, Ive also come to the conclusion that all three of these illnesses chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, and chronic Lyme are variations of the same fundamental problem: Loss of energy that can be sourced to mitochondrial dysfunction and disrupted communications within the body.
The list of possible coinfections includes mycoplasma, bartonella, babesia, anaplasma, ehrlichia, and rickettsia, but new microbes are being added to the list on a regular basis. In addition, most everyone with chronic Lyme disease is also found to have reactivation of EBV and a variety of other viruses.
Immune Disturbance Is A Clue Not An Answer
With some cytokines at lower levels and a few at higher levels, the study results indicate a markedly disturbed immune signature akin to patterns seen in cases of autoimmunity, the study authors concluded.
But a disturbed immune processes isnt specific enough to pinpoint the cause of the condition. It could be a virus or an allergy that sends the immune system off course, according to Hornig.
Theres still work to be done, in other words.
What we aim to do with this research is to fill up the empty toolkits of clinicians, Hornig said. There are no clear diagnostic tests, and there are no treatments in those toolkits either. We want to get some traction so that there isnt a disincentive for physicians to diagnose this illness.
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What Is Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Post Covid Signs Risk Factors Treatment
Many people suffer from chronic fatigue syndrome after recovering from COVID.
Cough, cold, sore throat, fever, chills, fatigue are some of the many symptoms of COVID-19. Patients experience these symptoms when infected with SARS-CoV-2. These signs should subside once the patient recovers. However, this doesnt happen in all cases. Some patients experience COVID symptoms way past recovering. One such condition that many experience is chronic fatigue syndrome post COVID. So, what is this syndrome? What causes it? What are the symptoms and risk factors? And, how can it be treated and prevented? For answers to these questions, Onlymyhealth spoke to Dr. Praveen Gupta, Principal Director & Head, Department of Neurology, Fortis Memorial Research Institute, Gurugram.
It Feels Like Im Seeing Everything From Underwater
Another thing Ive found useful in describing my symptoms to others is the use of nature-based metaphors. For example, I may tell somebody that my nerve pain feels like a wildfire leaping from one limb to another. Or I may explain that the cognitive difficulties Im experiencing feel like Im seeing everything from underwater, moving slowly and just out of reach.
Just like a descriptive part in a novel, these metaphors allow people to envision what I may be going through, even without having the personal experience.
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What Is Brain Fog Exactly
Most of us have experienced brain fog at some point or another. You know the feeling: You cant focus, youre forgetful, and you just feel off.
Brain fog is one of the symptoms of CFS, but it can also be caused by other conditions, such as depression, anxiety, sleep disorders, and thyroid problems.
Brain fog can make it difficult to concentrate, remember things, or make decisions. You may also feel foggy mentally or physically sluggish.
Try Smaller More Frequent Meals
Many people with chronic fatigue often feel too tired to eat or dont feel hungry. If youre losing weight or struggling to eat enough throughout the day, Groppo recommends trying smaller meals more frequently or adding small snacks between each meal. Eating more frequently may help keep your energy up. Smaller portions may be easier to tolerate as well.
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Can Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Be Prevented
CFS is cannot be cured or prevented. Those who have it often continue to live with the condition through the appropriate treatment and management of symptoms and some people may even undergo a complete recovery. Symptoms will generally worsen through too much physical or mental activity, periods of stress and lack of sleep. Although, treatment can noticeably improve and relieve the symptoms of CFS.
How Is Me/cfs Treated
There is no cure for ME/CFS, but there are several things your doctor can suggest to help you relieve your symptoms and improve your quality of life.
Be careful when considering any commercially available product or treatment promoted as a cure for ME/CFS, as it doesnt have a known cure yet.
Current treatments have 2 key aspects.
- Pacing and rest: pacing is a strategy designed to help you live within your energy envelope this is the amount of energy you can safely use without triggering symptoms. It breaks down your activity into short bursts, interspersed with rest. The aim is to have some energy left at the end of the day. For more information about pacing, see the Emerge Australia fact sheet.
- Stepwise symptom management: this involves ranking your symptoms and exploring ways to reduce your symptoms, starting with the most problematic ones.
Your doctor may also suggest working with other healthcare professionals such as an occupational therapist, physiotherapist or psychologist.
Ask your doctor about how to best manage your work or school commitments while you are sick and when you might be ready to return.
It may also help if you:
- keep a diary to see whether certain activities or levels of exercise tend to trigger your symptoms
- make time to relax when you can
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