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Note that by clicking on those simonwessely.com links, Simon will be directed towards this site if someone decides to check where the traffic is coming from.
Welcome to Phoenix Rising!
Created in 2008, Phoenix Rising is the largest and oldest forum dedicated to furthering the understanding of, and finding treatments for, complex chronic illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia, long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.
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Another way to get there is to copy and paste into your browser.Note that by clicking on those simonwessely.com links, Simon will be directed towards this site if someone decides to check where the traffic is coming from.
Links to any site will also help that site's google ranking of course. Bad Science uses the convention of linking to sites that they don't like (us, for example) using the prefix 'hxxp' so that it doesn't count as a link; anyone wanting to check out such a link can paste into their browser and replace the x's with t's.Note that by clicking on those simonwessely.com links, Simon will be directed towards this site if someone decides to check where the traffic is coming from.
Ok, have edited my post like that.Links to any site will also help that site's google ranking of course. Bad Science uses the convention of linking to sites that they don't like (us, for example) using the prefix 'hxxp' so that it doesn't count as a link; anyone wanting to check out such a link can paste into their browser and replace the x's with t's.
Technical Summary
We propose to model chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) by studying patients taking interferon-alpha (IFN-alpha) for chronic viral hepatitis C (HCV) infection. IFN-alpha treatment leads to acute fatigue in the majority of patients. Most importantly, a proportion of patients continue to experience persistent fatigue, together with other CFS-like-symptoms, for many months after the cessation of treatment, that is, in the absence of the pro-inflammatory stimulus. This phenomenon strikingly resembles CFS, which also persists after the viral/immune trigger has been eliminated.
In order to develop this as a model of CFS, in our three-year project we want to:
1) assess a cohort (n=100) of patients throughout the IFN-alpha treatment and at 6 months after cessation of treatment, and identify the group who develop the persistent post-treatment fatigue (expected n=50 [ie half]);
2) validate this model, by comparing the clinical and biomarkers profiles in patients who experience persistent post-treatment fatigue, patients with CFS (n=50), and healthy controls (n=50);
3) identify the risk factors and the biomarkers trajectories (before and during IFN-alpha treatment) that identify those patients who will later experience persistent post-treatment fatigue.
We will measure: fatigue, mood, and other CFS-like symptoms; medical and psychiatric history; childhood and recent stressors; social support; illness and treatment perceptions; physical fitness; quality of life; and occupational function. Moreover, we will measure blood biomarkers: serum cytokines; cortisol at awakening and during the day; and leukocytes gene expression. The project will build onto an existing pilot study in HCV patients, an established collaboration with Liver Units across London, and the research-led clinical service for CFS patients at King's College Hospital. "Thus, the project has great chances of success."
They will also be looking at cortisol, another favourite of King's College researchers.Because it activates the immune system, IFN-alpha also induces fatigue and flu-like symptoms in all patients. Moreover, and of particular relevance for this study, a considerable proportion of patients continue to experience debilitating persistent fatigue, and other symptoms that are similar to CFS, for 6 months or even one year after the cessation of IFN-alpha. This phenomenon strikingly resembles CFS, which, as mentioned above, also persists after the infective/immune trigger has been eliminated. Therefore, we are proposing to use IFN-alpha as a model to understand how an immune trigger induces persistent fatigue even when the initial immune trigger is no longer present. To do this, we will assess these patients throughout the many months of IFN-alpha treatment and at 6 months after cessation of treatment, in order to identify those with persistent "post-IFN-alpha-treatment" fatigue, and understand what biological and clinical changes lead to this outcome.
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Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is a medical condition in which patients feel persistently and overwhelmingly tired and run down, both physically and mentally. In addition, they have difficulty with concentration, flu-like symptoms and aches and pains. This condition interferes with daily life activity, and, in some patients, is profoundly disabling. Although many years of research have been conduced on CFS, we still do not know what is causing it.
One biological system that is involved in CFS is the "immune system", that is, the system dedicated to fight infections in our body. Indeed, in many cases CFS is triggered by an infection, but then the symptoms continue even after the infection has been eliminated.
Specifically, infections are always accompanied by acute fatigue and flu-like symptoms, as a consequence of the infection-driven immune activation; however, in patients with CFS the immune activation and the associated fatigue and flu-like symptoms persist for months or years.
Moreover, there is evidence that the immune system is in a state of "hyper-activity" in patients with CFS, as if they were fighting an infective agent, even though they do not have an ongoing infection.
This project aims to understand exactly this process: how the infection and the acute immune activation evolve into CFS, and what are the risk factors that make this process occur in some individuals but not others.
Clearly, trying to study this process in subjects experiencing naturally-acquired infections is very difficult, for the unpredictability of these events.
In contrast, we want to model the development of CFS by studying a group of patients that have a pre-existing infection (chronic viral hepatitis C, HCV) and that receive a course of treatment (lasting months) with the immune activator, interferon-alpha (IFN-alpha).
IFN-alpha is the treatment of choice for HCV infection. Because it activates the immune system, IFN-alpha also induces fatigue and flu-like symptoms in all patients.
Moreover, and of particular relevance for this study, a considerable proportion of patients continue to experience debilitating persistent fatigue, and other symptoms that are similar to CFS, for 6 months or even one year after the cessation of IFN-alpha.
This phenomenon strikingly resembles CFS, which, as mentioned above, also persists after the infective/immune trigger has been eliminated.
Therefore, we are proposing to use IFN-alpha as a model to understand how an immune trigger induces persistent fatigue even when the initial immune trigger is no longer present.
To do this, we will assess these patients throughout the many months of IFN-alpha treatment and at 6 months after cessation of treatment, in order to identify those with persistent "post-IFN-alpha-treatment" fatigue, and understand what biological and clinical changes lead to this outcome.
Moreover, we will compare these patients with a group of patients with CFS and with a group of healthy individuals, conducting the same biological and clinical assessment.
We will measure changes occurring in blood hormones that are relevant to the immune function, such as "cytokines" and "cortisol".
In addition, we will asses changes in measures of well-being, including physical fitness, concentration, sleep and mood.
We are confident that creating and validating this model of CFS will generate a host of future studies aimed at improving the health of people with CFS.
For example,
1. we will be able to build a check-list of blood measures that could predict who will, and who will not, develop CFS;
2. we will test novel treatments for "post-IFN-alpha-treatment" fatigue, facilitated by the fact that these patients are homogeneous in their clinical background, and then extend these treatments to patients with CFS;
3. and, finally, we will truly understand what happens in the body during the development of CFS, and thus identify novel therapeutic approaches to interrupt this development.
cheers, FirestormmThanks Ocean
Ok. I think I understand. They have a clearly-defined patient cohort and trigger. They are going to simulate an immune response with a drug used in this case to treat Hep C...
So again they are assuming that the initial infection - the trigger - in Hep C has been treated effectively by IFN-alpha and that this is comparable to whatever the initial trigger was in patients who went on to develop 'CFS'.
Are patients - who have been treated for Hep C with IFN-alpha - candidates then for 'CFS' if the above symptoms post-treatment are observed? I guess they are.
But, again, the reasoning is that they know who had Hep C specifically and they know (or think it's reasonable to assume) that IFN-alpha treatment is leaving patients with 'CFS'-like symptoms: so that's the justification for the simulation.
As for tests for CFS and 'novel therapeutic approaches', I think that's just pie-in-the-sky that researchers seem to throw in to persuade funders to award grants. Don't hold your breath. But if they gain an insight into how immune activation can trigger long-term fatigue, that would be quite something.Why use Hepatitis C (HCV) patients?
HCV patients are a conveniently available, usually non-fatigued cohort receiving IFN-alpha. HCV is often unsymptomatic at first, it just quietly destroys your liver - IFN-a is there to boost the hosts immune reaction. It would be more interesting to treat healthy volunteers with IFN-a for 6 months, but this would be unethical due to the nasty side effects such as fatigue and depression.
hi Jenny, hope the treatment goes well. It seems cruel that your husband should be lucky enough to get a transplant only for it to be attacked by HCV again.Thanks oceanblue. This is interesting to me because my husband is starting a treatment trial at Kings with pegalated interferon and telaprovir for his Hep C in 2 days time. He had interferon (not pegalated) treatment 20 years ago but it failed to deal with the virus. Four years ago his liver failed and he was lucky enough to have a successful transplant, but of course the virus is now attacking his new liver.
The trial he is on is for patients who've had transplants. Treatment for them is more complicated as they are on an immune suppressant drug and the telaprovir will interact with that.
He had mild fatigue and flu-like symptoms for the 9 months he was on the interferon 20 years ago, but could still work full-time. He had no problems once the treatment ended. Hope it's the same this time round as I doubt we could cope with both of us ill with these symptoms!
I'm wondering if he'll be part of the MRC funded study.
I am amazed at the resources they have for dealing with Hep C patients at Kings - he has had tremendous care all along. The contrast with how they treat ME patients is huge.
Again it's more likely to result in a success (as well as being more efficient and cheaper) I would imagine than having to screen patients with 'CFS'.
Of particular relevance for this study, a considerable proportion of patients continue to experience debilitating persistent fatigue, and other symptoms that are similar to CFS, for 6 months or even one year after the cessation of IFN-alpha.
The mechanism they've chosen to study in a considerable proportion of these patients seems to resolve itself within six months to a year:
What success will they have in finding here the keys to our house?
Note that the study isn't intended to help Hep C patients, beyond the IFN-alpha treatment itself. The aim is to use it as a model of CFS to gain insights, then try to see if that model really does apply to CFS patients (though they won't be able to do that fully in this study).Given the background of Carmine Pariante/King's College what's a fair bet that this study won't find anything useful for Hep C patients, but try to blame it on psychological factors?
Another psychiatrist claiming to study immunity...
I know what you are saying Ember (I think), but the point is that in this model, treatment of the acute viral infection HPV with IFN-aplha stimulates an immune response that is believed to be comparable with 'CFS' - in so far as the immune system activation and the chronic symptomology.
'CFS' is diagnosed at the six-month stage and those who go on to develop 'CFS-like' symptoms following IFN-alpha do so at this point too - at least.
Myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), also referred to in the literature as chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), is a complex disease involving profound dysregulation of the central nervous system (CNS) [13] and immune system [48], dysfunction of cellular energy metabolism and ion transport [911] and cardiovascular abnormalities [1214] (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2796.2011.02428.x/full).
In the clinic, symptoms of sickness (for example, fatigue, reduced appetite, sleep disorders, altered mood and cognition) are well known to have a negative impact on the quality of life of patients with chronic inflammatory disorders