• 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 (FM), long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.

    To become a member, simply click the Register button at the top right.

Feel like ME/CFS has made me age faster

tinacarroll27

Senior Member
Messages
254
Location
UK
Just read this and it makes a lot of sense to me. I have always felt this illness has aged me.
Association of chronic fatigue syndrome with premature telomere attrition
  • Mangalathu S. Rajeevan
  • Janna Murray,
  • Lisa Oakley,
  • Jin-Mann S. Lin and Elizabeth R. Unger

Published: 27 February 2018

here is link:
https://translational-medicine.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12967-018-1414-x


Background
Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), also known as myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), is a severely debilitating condition of unknown etiology. The symptoms and risk factors of ME/CFS share features of accelerated aging implicated in several diseases. Using telomere length as a marker, this study was performed to test the hypothesis that ME/CFS is associated with accelerated aging.

Methods
Participant (n = 639) data came from the follow-up time point of the Georgia CFS surveillance study. Using the 1994 CFS Research Case Definition with questionnaire-based subscale thresholds for fatigue, function, and symptoms, participants were classified into four illness groups: CFS if all criteria were met (n = 64), CFS-X if CFS with exclusionary conditions (n = 77), ISF (insufficient symptoms/fatigue) if only some criteria were met regardless of exclusionary conditions (n = 302), and NF (non-fatigued) if no criteria and no exclusionary conditions (n = 196). Relative telomere length (T/S ratio) was measured using DNA from whole blood and real-time PCR. General linear models were used to estimate the association of illness groups or T/S ratio with demographics, biological measures and covariates with significance set at p < 0.05.

Results
The mean T/S ratio differed significantly by illness group (p = 0.0017); the T/S ratios in CFS (0.90 ± 0.03) and ISF (0.94 ± 0.02) were each significantly lower than in NF (1.06 ± 0.04). Differences in T/S ratio by illness groups remained significant after adjustment for covariates of age, sex, body mass index, waist–hip ratio, post-exertional malaise and education attainment. Telomere length was shorter by 635, 254 and 424 base pairs in CFS, CFS-X and ISF, respectively, compared to NF. This shorter telomere length translates to roughly 10.1–20.5, 4.0–8.2 and 6.6–13.7 years of additional aging in CFS, CFS-X and ISF compared to NF respectively. Further, stratified analyses based on age and sex demonstrated that the association of ME/CFS with short telomeres is largely moderated by female subjects < 45 years old.

Conclusions
This study found a significant association of ME/CFS with premature telomere attrition that is largely moderated by female subjects < 45 years old. Our results indicate that ME/CFS could be included in the list of conditions associated with accelerated aging. Further work is needed to evaluate the functional significance of accelerated aging in ME/CFS.
 

Wishful

Senior Member
Messages
5,679
Location
Alberta
Hmmm, not intending to insult their work, but I have a feeling that if you manipulate statistical data enough, you can find some sort of correlation that will support a hypothesis. I'll wait for further research...if I don't die of old age first, of course. :)
 

alex3619

Senior Member
Messages
13,810
Location
Logan, Queensland, Australia
We do seem to have a shortened lifespan, but even that needs better epidemiological investigation. This study may not be of the highest quality, and we need to wait for better research. OMF or NIH will probably investigate this further at some point. I certainly feel old. For decades I looked younger than my years, aside from greying hair. All of a sudden I look much older than my biological age. These things take a toll, whatever the reason.

This is a tentative study ... let us ask the question until we have answers, but its not something I am going to lose sleep over.
 

Wishful

Senior Member
Messages
5,679
Location
Alberta
One bias is looking for something in particular, such as ageing, and finding correlations that are misleading. In the study Marco pointed to, sedentary behaviour is linked to premature ageing. If true, then yes, ME/CFS might include premature ageing, but indirectly from its effect on our activity levels. I wouldn't consider it a ME/CFS specific problem. I do try to keep my fitness level up because sedentary behaviour is bad for us for many reasons.
 

medfeb

Senior Member
Messages
491
The selection criteria, primarily. Done today this kind of study should use ICC or CCC criteria.

However this does not mean they are necessarily wrong, only that there is increased risk of bias.

Agree. The selection criteria in this study increased prevalence 10 fold over the CDC's earlier epidemiological studies. The IOM dismissed the criteria because it included an overrepresentation of PTSD and depression. Hard to say how it applies to patients with ME.