Is Chronic Fatigue Syndrome an Infectious Disease?

A study from US showed for the first time that stomach biopsy may be a good method to find a dormant virus in patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS). This disabling condition affects a significant proportion of the work-age population and takes an expensive toll on health care costs. There is a significant correlation between this disease and IBS; however researchers do not have a good explanation for this connection. Dr. John Chia is the co-Author of this paper and he is the father of Andrew Chia, now 24, who was diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome in 1997. Many researchers in the past have tried to connect the viral infections such as enterovirous to CFS, but the main way of searching for the virus was blood tests. In this study, 82% of the stomach specimens from CFS patients tested positive for enteroviral particles while only 20 percent of the samples from healthy people showed the same virus particles. It is worth mentioning that enteroviruses can cause acute respiratory and gastrointestinal infections in healthy individuals. In most cases, the enterovirus infection has a brief, self-limited course. Obtaining a stomach specimen for diagnosis of the enterovirus infection is not currently considered a standard diagnostic test. washingtonpost.com
2007-10-10 12:34:49