Patients with chronic fatigue syndrome can suffer significant problems with faintness and unsteadiness, particularly on standing. Objective scientific assessment of a patient’s autonomic reflexes in health and illness may therefore reveal more about this type of symptom. Freeman Hospital Medical Physics Department have recently developed world-leading multi-site peripheral pulse technology to allow the precise quantification of peripheral and global vascular responses to changes in body position, and on a heart beat by heart beat basis.

The application of such technology to CFS sufferers is completely new. In the proposed research study the changes in peripheral blood flow will be recorded whilst a patient undergoes a simple lying down to standing up manoeuvre, and with responses compared to fatigue severity. The grant funding awarded from the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and ME Northern Clinical Network has enabled the purchase of a special patient tilt table system - vital for making reliable supine-to-standing multi-site pulse measurements. The research team comprises Dr John Allen (Principal Medical Physicist, Lead Scientist), Mr Sam Stevens (Newcastle University Study Research Associate), Professor Alan Murray (Professor of Cardiovascular Physics and Engineering), and Dr Julia Newton (Consultant Physician, Lead Clinician and falls and syncope specialist).

We hope to publish the main findings of the research in early 2008. Ultimately, this assessment could become an important and useful additional test to assess patients suffering with CFS/ME.
For more information on the research project please contact [email protected].