Long-term dietary interventions induced significant weight loss and improved cardiovascular risk in high-risk patients. The prepared meal plan simultaneously provided the simplicity and nutrient composition necessary to maintain long-term compliance and to reduce cardiovascular risk.
Aerobic fitness was evaluated in 25 women with fibrositis, by having them exercise to volitional exhaustion on an electronically braked cycle ergometer. Compared with published standards, >80% of the fibrositis patients were not physically fit, as assessed by maximal oxygen uptake. Compared with matched sedentary controls, fibrositis patients accurately perceived their level of exertion in relation to oxygen consumption and attained a similar level of lactic acidosis, as assessed by their respiratory quotient and ventilatory threshold. Exercising muscle blood flow was estimated by '33xenon clearance in a subgroup of 16 fibrositis patients and compared with that in 16 matched sedentary controls; the fibrositis patients exhibited reduced '"xenon clearance. These results indicate a need to include aerobic fitness as a matched variable in future controlled studies of fibrositis and suggest that the "detraining phenomenon" may be of relevance to the etiopathogenesis of the disease.Fibrositis remains a perplexing enigma; apart from semiobjective findings of tender points, the physical examination findings are normal, and there is no acceptable pathophysiologic explanation for the symp-
Objective. Fibromyalgia is a common syndrome of musculoskeletal pain and fatigue. Lacking distinctive tissue or laboratory correlations, it has often been considered a form of "psychogenic rheumatism.'' In the present study, the notion that the stage4 sleep anomaly typically seen in the fibromyalgia syndrome may disrupt growth hormone secretion was tested. Because growth hormone has a very short half-life, serum levels of somatomedin C were measured; somatomedin C is the major mediator of growth hormone's anabolic actions and is a prerequisite for normal muscle homeostasis.Methods. Serum levels of somatomedin C were measured in 70 female fibromyalgia patients and 55 healthy controls, using a peptide-specific radioimmunoassay.Results. Significantly lower levels of somatomedin C were observed in the fibromyalgia patients compared with controls (mean 2 SD 124.7 f 47 ng/ml versus 175.2 2 60 ng/ml; P = 0.OoooOl).
The efficacy of cyclobenzaprine (Flexeril), as compared with placebo, was tested in a 12‐week, double‐blind, controlled trial of 120 patients with fibrositis. Of the patients who received placebo, 52% dropped out due to lack of efficacy of the drug, compared with 16% of patients taking cyclobenzaprine. The dropout rate due to adverse reactions was similar in the 2 groups. Patients taking cyclobenzaprine experienced a significant decrease in the severity of pain and a significant increase in the quality of sleep. There was a trend toward improvement in the symptoms of fatigue, but morning stiffness was not alleviated. These improvements in symptoms were associated with a significant reduction in the total number of tender points and in muscle tightness. Our findings indicate that cyclobenzaprine is a useful adjunct in treating patients with the fibrositis syndrome.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.