We now know the cause for ME/CFS http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1219207/Chronic-fatigue-caused-retrovirus-say-scientists.html Well, maybe, but let’s not get carried away.
While this discovery looks promising, a treatment/cure for ME/CFS is probably a long way off – the first step is to review and independently verify the research. If it pans out then – if Big Pharma is willing to invest the time and money – the search for a cure can begin. Maybe.
The trouble is that Continue reading
Another from my search-engine slush-pile – Can flu shot trigger ME/CFS?
In my opinion, no. There is not the slightest evidence that the flu shot can actually cause ME/CFS. You may read that it can in the lunatic-fringe, all-vaccines-are-the-spawn-of-Satan blogs and websites, but it’s just not true.
What the flu shot can do – and in my experience always does – is Continue reading
I wrote the full version of this post on July 19, and forgot to post a copy here…
In Loafing around, I mentioned that the pain from the arthritis in my hands and elbows was causing problems. It was, too; the pain after the first loaf was pretty serious, though I played it down so as not to deter anyone else from trying. A little over a week – and three loaves – later, the pain has abated considerably. Just a bit in my thumbs and wrists now, and I can live with that.
That got me thinking about bread-making and ME/CFS – and I think, for many, that it’s a pretty good idea and, unlike most things that require physical effort, or exercise which you may feel is pointless, you have something to eat at the end of it. Seems like a fair trade-off to me. It does depend on the degree to which the individual is affected, of course, but still…
To read more, go to my bread-making blog, where you’ll find the continuation of this post, plus a lot more on this subject.
I came across someone a little while ago, regarding ME/CFS, who asked the question “why me?” I was actually moved to write about it at the time – this is a much modified version of the original post.
I have to say that this is one question it’s never occurred to me to ask. One might as well ask, with equal validity, “why not me?”. It simply doesn’t matter. Shit, as our transatlantic cousins are wont to observe, happens.
I might as well ask Continue reading
The following letter is from Campaigning for Research into ME (RiME), to the NHS Services Inquiry. As it has been the subject of a bulk mailing, I consider it to be in the public domain, and thus there is no copyright infringement.
What concerns me, deeply, is that this letter refers to the 1969 WHO definition of ME as neurological but Continue reading
I came across someone a little while ago, regarding ME/CFS, who asked the question “why me?”
I have to say that this is one question it’s never occurred to me to ask. One might as well ask, with equal validity, “why not me?”. It simply doesn’t matter.
Likewise, it’s never Continue reading
I have ME. I’ve had it for 24 years and, for all that time, I’ve trusted the literature on the subject, but today that trust has been shaken to it’s very foundations.
I was in the middle of writing a blog post – not this one – about ME and why it’s not CFS, and citing the World Health Organisation’s definition of ME.
WHO ICD-10 G93.3 Multi-System organic/physical Neurological Disorder
As you may know, the WHO’s definition, dating from 1969 is cited by everybody involved with ME, it’s in all the literature – I’ve even mentioned it myself in passing, but this time, as it was a main plank of my argument, I did what I always do, Continue reading
My attention was drawn, recently, to the “Gupta Amygdala RetrainingTM ” programme.
This, apparently, “is a brand new powerful treatment for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, ME, Fibromyalgia, and associated conditions.”
So, leaving aside the question of what associated conditions, let’s a have a look at it.
Ashok Gupta draws upon his own theories in “Unconscious Amygdalar Fear Conditioning in a Subset of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Patients,” a paper published in 2002, not in a medical journal, like the BMJ, or The Lancet, or, perhaps, Continue reading
In the beginning was the darkness…
Born into the slums, and amid the dark, Satanic mills, of Manchester, I think it’s fair to say that, from early childhood, I’ve never been well. Around the age of 2, simultaneous whooping cough and measles conspired to wreck my lungs, the upshot being that I had about 50% normal lung capacity on a good day when growing up, much less on bad days, and a massive susceptibility to respiratory infection. Had it not been for the arrival of antibiotics I wouldn’t be here to bitch about it, as I got pneumonia the way other kids got colds. As it was, it was a close-run thing. Continue reading
More from the realm of the search engine…
Muscle relaxants for COPD.
Well – how would you breathe, for a start?
Muscle relaxants are used on end-stage, mechanically-ventilated COPD patients (and if I get the that stage, I’m pulling the plug; seriously – that’s not bravado), who can’t breathe for themselves anyway. Maybe the questioner is confusing muscle relaxants with bronchodilators, which “relax” (actually, dilate), the bronchi (airways) in the lungs.
I did check this online, and came across this nonsense. Despite what that website claims, there is no drug called COPD – not in the UK, anyway. I mean, how stupid would it be to give a drug the same acronym as a condition?
By the way, beware of drugs containing Guaifenesin if you have ME/CFS. It’s touted as a remedy, but it set me back about five years, with a massive relapse from which I haven’t recovered. See this post and the two following it.
Ron's Rants... 