Heart Problems Due to low blood volume not mitochondrial problems?

[Cort]

A recent fascinating study suggested that the diastolic dysfunction that Dr. Cheney is finding and the low stroke volume output that others have found may not be due to some sort of energetic problem but simply to the fact that CFS patients don't have normal amounts of blood in their systems. once the investigators statistically accounted for the low blood volume in the CFS patients the other cardiac issues disappeared.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19469714?ordinalpos=28&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

The befuddling thing here is that correcting blood volume in most CFS patients does not fix their symptoms! If this study is correct then the heart issues Dr. Cheney is focusing on may be secondary to other issues. Still the fact that low blood volume has now been shown to be present in CFS patients several studies does give researchers a clue. It is after all an unusual symptom - well it may not cause CFS it's possible that whatever is causing low blood volume - could cause or at least contribute to CFS.

 

[Jody]

The blood volume issue is pretty intriguing.

Can't remember where I first came across it, but once again, the ways to combat the effects for people with CFS are contrary to the common wisdom of health.

Drinking lots of water helps. Okay, that is in line with the common wisdom.

But more salt in the diet rather than less is a good way to lessen the symptoms at least (since we don't know the cause of the lower blood volume). And yet we are constantly told that we need to use less salt.

Another way in which people with CFS end up sabotaged by trying to follow health advice which just does not work for us.

 

[Jody]

The blood volume thing relates to the blood perfusion thing, which may help explain some CFS symptoms.

(Perfusion -- The injection of fluid into a blood vessel in order to reach an organ or tissues, usually to supply nutrients and oxygen.)

I can't remember if this was something from Dr. Cheney? I think so, and if so, I read this maybe 3 - 4 years ago I think.

Many of us have low blood volume. The body likes to keep all its essentials well-supplied with blood, and if it has lower blood volume, it will ... cut some corners.

The author used an example of a garden hose, and how you can change the spray. He said, as I recall it, that our circulatory system has many of these types of valves which regulate blood perfusion.

If blood volume is low, the body has its priorities, various organs, brain, etc. and a heirarchy of what can be shorted a bit and still be safe.

Don't remember the exact order now, but the idea was, extremities might get a little less, and certain parts of the brain that are not going to make the difference between living and dying, if the blood circulating is a bit ... short.

Well now. That told me something new. Maybe this had something to do with the "head stone" (pardon the old hippy jargon, but it is still the briefest and most accurate description of this symptom) as well as the numbness and tingling and vibrating -- the parasthesia -- that I would often get, especially in hands and lower arms.

Also maybe helped explain why sometimes I could do some types of thinking, with no problem, and other times, I would fumble and falter, on the outside of a locked door with no way in.

Blood volume, as a factor in many hypotheses, presents alot of food for thought.