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The following is a summary of “Chronic Overlapping Pain Conditions in people with Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS): a sample from the Multi-site Clinical Assessment of ME/CFS (MCAM) study,” published in the October 2024 issue of Neurology by Fall et al.    

Chronic overlapping pain conditions (COPCs) often co-occur in patients with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), potentially influencing the severity of their illness.  

Researchers conducted a retrospective study to identify comorbid COPCs in patients with ME/CFS and evaluate the impact on illness severity.  

They analyzed data from 923 participants (595 with ME/CFS and 328 HCs) in the Multi-Site Clinical Assessment of ME/CFS study (2012 to 2020). The COPCs included chronic low back pain (cLBP), chronic migraine/headache (cMHA), fibromyalgia (FM), interstitial cystitis/irritable bladder (IC/IB), irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), and temporomandibular disorder (TMD). Illness severity was assessed using questionnaires measuring symptoms and functioning, employing multivariate analysis of variance and analysis of covariance models. Log-binomial regression analyses computed the prevalence of COPCs and prevalence ratios (PR) between groups with 95% CI.  

The results showed that 76% of participants with ME/CFS had at least 1 COPC, compared to 17.4% of HCs. Among participants with ME/CFS, cMHA  (48.1%) was the most prevalent, followed by FM (45.0%), cLBP (33.1%), and IBS (31.6%). All individual COPCs, except TMD, were significantly more frequent in females than males. The unadjusted prevalence ratio for FM (147.74; 95% CI= 20.83–1047.75) was the highest, followed by cLBP (39.45; 12.73–122.27) and IC/IB (13.78; 1.88–101.24). The significance and order remained consistent after adjustment for age and sex, cLBP and FM significantly impacted most health measures, particularly pain attributes (Cohen’s d effect size of 0.8 or larger). Although the impact of COPCs on non-pain attributes and QoL measures was less pronounced, statistically significant differences were still evident between patients with and without COPCs.  

They concluded that over 75% of patients with ME/CFS had 1 or more COPCs, which exacerbated illness severity, particularly among females.  

Source: bmcneurol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12883-024-03872-0