Background

 

Encephalomyelitis Disseminata (Multiple Sclerosis) and Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS) are both classified as diseases of the central nervous system by the World Health Organization. This review aims to compare the phenomenological and neuroimmune characteristics of MS with those of ME/CFS.

 

Discussion

 

There are remarkable phenomenological and neuroimmune overlaps between both disorders. Patients with ME/CFS and MS both experience severe levels of disabling fatigue and a worsening of symptoms following exercise and resort to energy conservation strategies in an attempt to meet the energy demands of day-to-day living. Debilitating autonomic symptoms, diminished cardiac responses to exercise, orthostatic intolerance and postural hypotension are experienced by patients with both illnesses. Both disorders show a relapsing-remitting or progressive course, while infections and psychosocial stress play a large part in worsening of fatigue symptoms. Activated immune inflammatory, oxidative and nitrosative (O+NS) pathways and autoimmunity occur in both illnesses. The consequences of O+NS damage to self-epitopes are evidenced by the almost bewildering and almost identical array of autoantibodies formed against damaged epitopes seen in both illnesses. Mitochondrial dysfunctions, including lowered levels of ATP, decreased phosphocreatine synthesis and impaired oxidative phosphorylation, are heavily involved in the pathophysiology of both MS and ME/CFS. The findings produced by neuroimaging techniques are quite similar in both illnesses and show decreased cerebral blood flow, atrophy, gray matter reduction, white matter hyperintensities, increased cerebral lactate and choline signaling and lowered acetyl-aspartate levels.

 

Summary

 

This review shows that there are neuroimmune similarities between MS and ME/CFS. This further substantiates the view that ME/CFS is a neuroimmune illness and that patients with MS are immunologically primed to develop symptoms of ME/CFS.

 

The full electronic version of this article is the complete one and can be found online at BMC Medicine, by clicking here.

 

Keywords:

Encephalomyelitis Disseminata; Myalgic Encephalomyelitis; Chronic Fatigue Syndrome; Inflammation; Autoimmunity; Oxidative and Nitrosative Stress; Mitochondria

 

Corresponding authors: Gerwyn Morris and Michael Maes: activatedmicroglia@gmail.com

 

Received: 16 June 2013

Accepted: 15 August 2013

Published: 17 September 2013

© 2013 Morris and Maes; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

 

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.