Wassif, W S, Sherman, D, Salisbury, J R et al. · Annals of clinical biochemistry · 1994 · DOI
Researchers tested muscle function and examined muscle samples from people with ME/CFS and people with chronic alcohol problems to see if their muscle problems were similar or different. They found that while some people initially thought to have ME/CFS actually had other conditions (like a rare enzyme deficiency or inflammation), the muscle changes in alcohol misuse were quite distinct and recognizable through muscle biopsies.
This study demonstrates that dynamic muscle testing and biopsy can help rule out treatable alternative diagnoses that may be misclassified as ME/CFS, including specific enzyme deficiencies and inflammatory myopathies. Accurate differential diagnosis is critical because conditions like myoadenylate deaminase deficiency and polymyositis require different medical management than ME/CFS.
This study does not establish the underlying cause of muscle dysfunction in ME/CFS itself, nor does it prove that muscle abnormalities are central to ME/CFS pathophysiology. The small sample size and cross-sectional design limit generalizability, and the study cannot determine whether the identified alternative diagnoses represent cases of diagnostic misclassification or comorbidity.
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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