{"id":18609,"date":"2018-11-13T07:49:32","date_gmt":"2018-11-13T07:49:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/?p=18609"},"modified":"2018-11-13T07:54:26","modified_gmt":"2018-11-13T07:54:26","slug":"hand-grip-strength-as-a-clinical-biomarker-for-me-cfs-disease-severity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/hand-grip-strength-as-a-clinical-biomarker-for-me-cfs-disease-severity\/","title":{"rendered":"Hand grip strength as a clinical biomarker for ME\/CFS & disease severity"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hand grip strength as a clinical biomarker for ME\/CFS and disease\u00a0severity<\/a>, by Luis C Nacul, Kathleen Mudie, Caroline Kingdon, Taane G\u00a0Clark, Eliana M Lacerda in\u00a0Frontiers in Neurology, 5 Nov 2018 [Preprint]<\/h3>\n

Research abstract:<\/h3>\n

Background:<\/strong>
\nThe diagnosis of myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME\/CFS) in research and\u00a0clinical practice has largely relied on clinical history, which can be\u00a0subjective in nature. Clinical signs are often subtle, overlap with\u00a0other conditions, and are not formally included as part of diagnostic\u00a0workup. The characterisation of clinical signs and biomarkers is needed\u00a0for better diagnosis and classification of patients and to monitor\u00a0treatment response.<\/p>\n

Hand grip strength (HGS) has been used as an\u00a0objective measure of muscle strength and fatigue, which is a primary\u00a0symptom of ME\/CFS. We assessed the potential usefulness of HGS as a\u00a0diagnostic marker in ME\/CFS.<\/p>\n

\"\"Methods:<\/strong>
\nWe compared HGS measurements from participants in the UK ME\/CFS Biobank,\u00a0with groups consisting of people with ME\/CFS of differing severity\u00a0(n=272), healthy (n=136), multiple sclerosis (n=76) controls, and others\u00a0with chronic fatigue not meeting the diagnosis of ME\/CFS (n=37). We\u00a0correlated the maximum and minimum of, and differences between, 3\u00a0repeated HGS measurements with parameters of disease severity, including\u00a0fatigue and pain analog scales, and physical and mental component\u00a0summaries from the SF-36v2TM questionnaire across recruitment groups.<\/p>\n

Results:<\/strong>
\nHGS indicators were associated with having ME\/CFS, with magnitudes of\u00a0association stronger in severely affected than in mild\/moderately\u00a0affected patients. Compared with healthy controls, being severely\u00a0affected was associated with a reduction in minimum HGS of 15.3kg (95%CI\u00a019.3-11.3; p<0.001), while being mild\/moderately affected was associated\u00a0with a 10.5kg (95%CI 13.2-7.8; p<0.001) reduction. The association\u00a0persisted after adjusting for age, sex and body mass index. ME\/CFS cases\u00a0also showed lower values of maximum HGS and significant drops in values\u00a0from the first to second and third trials, compared to other study\u00a0groups. There were significant correlations between HGS indicators and\u00a0clinical parameters of disease severity, including fatigue analog scale
\n(Spearman’s Rho= -0.40, p<0.001), pain analog scale (Rho=-0.38,\u00a0p<0.001), and physical component summary (Rho=0.42, p<0.001).<\/p>\n

Discussion:<\/strong>
\nHGS is markedly reduced in ME\/CFS, particularly in patients with more\u00a0severe disease, and may indicate muscle and fatigue related symptoms.<\/p>\n

HGS is a potential diagnostic tool in ME\/CFS, and could also be used to\u00a0enhance patient phenotyping and as an outcome measure following\u00a0interventions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hand grip strength as a clinical biomarker for ME\/CFS and disease\u00a0severity, by Luis C Nacul, Kathleen Mudie, Caroline Kingdon, Taane G\u00a0Clark, Eliana M Lacerda in\u00a0Frontiers in Neurology, 5 Nov 2018 [Preprint] Research abstract: Background: The diagnosis of myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME\/CFS) … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[4170,4717,3425,3529,4715,4718,4716],"class_list":["post-18609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-biomarker","tag-caroline-kingdon","tag-dr-luis-nacul","tag-eliana-m-lacerda","tag-hand-grip-strength","tag-kathleen-mudie","tag-taane-g-clark"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5qkYK-4Q9","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18609"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18609\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18614,"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18609\/revisions\/18614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wames.org.uk\/cms-english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}