Maeda, Kensei I, Islam, Mohammed F, Conroy, Karl E et al. · Psychology, health & medicine · 2023 · DOI
This study looked at how common sensitivity to light and sound are in people with ME/CFS compared to people with multiple sclerosis (MS). Researchers surveyed over 2,200 people and found that people with ME/CFS experience these sensitivities much more often than people with MS. People who had both light and sound sensitivity reported feeling worse overall than those without these sensitivities.
Sensory hypersensitivities are common and debilitating in ME/CFS but are not consistently recognized in diagnostic criteria. This research demonstrates that these symptoms are significantly more prevalent in ME/CFS than in other chronic illnesses, supporting their inclusion in case definitions and highlighting the need for clinical attention to photophobia and phonophobia in patient care and treatment planning.
This study cannot establish whether sensory hypersensitivities cause worse health outcomes or result from ME/CFS pathology—only that they co-occur. The cross-sectional design prevents determination of whether these sensitivities develop before, during, or after ME/CFS onset. The findings also do not explain the underlying biological mechanisms driving these hypersensitivities.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
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