Journal of Chronic Fatigue
Syndrome:
Multidisciplinary Innovations in Research, Theory, and
Clinical Practice
Volume: 9 Issue:
1/2
ISSN: 1057-3321 Pub Date: 10/4/2001
Concomitant Environmental
Chemical Intolerance Modifies the Neurobehavioral
Presentation of Women with Fibromyalgia
-
Iris R. Bell MD,
PhD, Department of Psychiatry, Department of Psychology,
Family and Community Medicine (the Program in
Integrative Medicine), Southern Arizona VA Healthcare
System
-
Carol M. Baldwin
RN, PhD, HNC, Department of Psychology, the Department
of Medicine, Southern Arizona VA Healthcare System
-
Erin Stoltz BA,
Department of Psychiatry, Southern Arizona VA Helthcare
System
-
Bridget T. Walsh DO,
Southern Arizona VA Healthcare System and the Department
of Medicinej
-
Gary E.R. Schwartz
PhD, Department of Psychiatry, the Department of
Psychology, Department of Neurology, University of
Arizona College of Medicine, Tucson, AZ
The Journal of Chronic Fatigue
Syndrome is © Copyrighted by The Haworth Press, Inc
Reprinted with Expressed Permission of The Haworth Press,
Inc
Abstract:
Background:
This study compared
personality, dietary, and psychophysiological
characteristics of 3 groups of women: fibromyalgia (FM) with
illness from low levels of environmental chemicals (chemical
intolerance, CI), FM alone without CI, and normal controls.
CI may be a marker for enhanced central nervous system
response amplification (sensitization) in limbic and
mesolimbic pathways, which play a role in hedonic responses
to food and drugs and in pain.
Method:
Fibromyalgic women with
(FM/CI, n = 11) and without CI (FM, n = 10) and normals
(NORM, n = 10) participated in the study. Measures included
psychological trait questionnaires, a food frequency
questionnaire, a taste test for hedonic and sweetness
ratings of different sucrose concentrations, pain
self-ratings, and resting spectral electroencephalographic
alpha over midline sites, averaged over four separate days.
Results:
FM with CI had the highest
scores on the Harm Avoidance dimension of the Tridimensional
Personality Questionnaire, Carbohydrate Addicts Test, Limbic
Symptom sensory and behavior subscales, and SCL-90-R
somatization and obsessiveness subscales. FM groups both had
the highest mean pain ratings for 21 tender point sites.
Groups did not differ for macronutrient intake or for
sweetness and hedonic ratings for sucrose. The combined FM
groups had greater EEG alpha activity towards posterior
midline sites than did normals.
Conclusion:
The pattern of findings may
reflect impaired serotonergic function and/or elevated
dopaminergic receptor activation by endogenous and/or
exogenous agents. The data could have implications for
pharmacological and dietary interventions in different
subsets of FM patients
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