ME/CFS -thalamus malfunction?

[Guest guest]

www.cfs-healing.info

Clinical CFS-study in Switzerland

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(Warning: I suffer from ME-CFIDS-CFS myself and due to

brain-fog I can not guarantee that the information in this report is

100% accurate!)

18. October 2006

" Cerebral Volumetry and Diffusion Tensor Imaging

of the Thalamus with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome "

This clinical CFS-study in Switzerland is currently in progress. It

takes place in the capital of Switzerland, Berne. (At the Insel

Spital; departement of psychosomatic medicine / general

internal medicine.)

Physician in charge is Dr. med. Stefan Begré

Dr. Begré's team recently checked my brain with a magnetic

resonance tomography device.

(Translation!? Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)? German:

" Magnet Resonanz Tomographie MRT " )

60 patients with ME-CFIDS-CFS and a control group with 60

healthy patients will undergo measurements/brain scans with

magnetic resonance tomography.

(The 60 ill subjects are being tested rigorously via many

questionnaires and personal interrogation to make sure that they

suffer from the 'real deal', and to assess the various

CFS-subgroups.)

Dr. Begré and his fellow researchers suspect a serious

malfunction of the thalamus; they also don't want to exclude the

possibility of the additional influence of some (yet not

discovered?) virus.

As soon as the results of my brain scan arrive, I will publish them

here.

I posted info about this study here for German speakers:

Informationen über diese studie für Deutsch sprechende:

Cfs-board.de/forum

http://www.cfs-board.de/cfsforum/thread.php?threadid=272

Brain Scan / Neuroimaging (Wikipedia)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_scan

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19. October 2006

Some questions I got via email and forum posts:

What is the actual thalamus malfunction?

If we only knew! I guess they are not sure - they suspect a

'general imbalance' of the thalamus, if I understood Dr. Begré

correctly.

What exactly is the function of the thalamus?

Wikipedia says:

- There is not a single thalamic function...

- The thalamus also plays an important role in regulating states

of sleep and wakefulness...

- Thalamic nuclei have strong reciprocal connections with the

cerebral cortex... ...are believed to be involved with

consciousness.

- The thalamus plays a major role in regulating arousal, the level

of awareness and activity.

- An animal with a severely damaged or severed thalamus

suffers permanent coma.

- Many different functions are linked to the system to which

thalamic parts belong... : ... sensory systems ... auditory,

somatic, visceral, gustatory and visual systems.

- A major role of the thalamus is devoted to " motor " systems.

Newer research suggests that thalamic function is even more

complicated.

Livescience.com (~jvr: see below)

http://www.livescience.com/humanbiology/060817_brain_boot.html

Thalamus (Wikipedia)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalamus

If the thalamus indeed controls and regulates all those functions

a lot of our CFS-symptoms would really be the logical

consequence of a thalamus imbalance!

Where are links to more information on the study?

Dr. Begré said a scientific paper is going to be published soon.

I keep you updated.

fox

Switzerland

www.cfs-healing.info

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http://www.livescience.com/humanbiology/060817_brain_boot.html

Your Brain Boots Up Like a Computer

By Abigail W. Leonard

Special to LiveScience

posted: 17 August 2006

As we yawn and open our eyes in the morning, the brain stem

sends little puffs of nitric oxide to another part of the brain, the

thalamus, which then directs it elsewhere.

Like a computer booting up its operating system before running

more complicated programs, the nitric oxide triggers certain

functions that set the stage for more complex brain operations,

according to a new study.

In these first moments of the day, sensory information floods the

system-the bright sunlight coming through the curtains, the time

on the screeching alarm clock-and all of it needs to be

processed and organized, so the brain can understand its

surroundings and begin to perform more complex tasks.

" The thinking part of the brain is applying a sort of stencil to the

information coming in and what the nitric oxide is doing is

allowing more refinement of that stencil, " says Dwayne Godwin,

an associate professor at Wake Forest University and lead

author of the study, which was funded by the National Eye

Institute.

The little two-atom molecule, it seems, is partly responsible for

our ability to perceive whatever it is we're sensing.

The finding, published last week in the journal Neuroscience,

changes the way scientists understand nitric oxide's role in the

brain, and it also has them rethinking the function of the

thalamus, where it is released. The thalamus was thought to be

a fairly primitive structure, sort of a gate that could either open

and allow sensory information to stream into the cortex, the

higher functioning part of the brain, or cut off the flow entirely.

Godwin says the new research shows it's more accurate to think

of the thalamus not as a gate but as a club bouncer, who doesn't

simply allow a huge rush of people to go in or no one at all, but

picks and chooses whom to let in and out.

" Instead of vision being a process going straight from eye to

cortex, it's more of a loop, " Godwin explained. " This constitutes

a new role for the thalamus in directing, not just modulating. "

While this study is the first to identify nitric oxide's role in the

thalamus, elsewhere in the body it was already known to have an

important, if somewhat different function. The molecule is

actually integral to controlling blood flow and is, in fact, the

molecule Viagra targets in order to increase blood flow to the

penis.

The teeny molecule might have other medical uses.

" This study shows a unique role for nitric oxide. It may help us to

someday understand what goes wrong in diseases that affect

cognitive processing, such as attention deficit disorder or

schizophrenia, and it adds to our fundamental understanding of

how we perceive the world around us, " Godwin said.