Cognitive Slowing and Working Memory Difficulties in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Marshall, Paul; Forstot, Michele; Callies, Allan L.; Peterson, Phillip K.; Schenck, Carlos H.

doi:10.1097/00006842-199701000-00008

Cited by 92 publications

(88 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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“…This finding is in accordance with previous reports indicating alterations in working memory, including the SWM task of the CANTAB, in patients with CFS (Joyce et al, 1996;Marshall et al, 1997). In addition, CFS patients with One CFS subject with significant mental fatigue missed all target sequences, and therefore did not obtain any values for these measurements.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 94%

“…This finding is supported by previous data indicating reduced information-processing speed in CFS patients (Marshall et al, 1997(Marshall et al, , 1999. CFS patients with significant mental fatigue did not show, however, any significant slowing in tasks requiring lower cognitive demand/control, including the task of simple and choice RTI and PRM.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 89%

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Cognitive Dysfunction Relates to Subjective Report of Mental Fatigue in Patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Capuron

Welberg

Heim

et al. 2006

Neuropsychopharmacol

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Patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) frequently complain of cognitive dysfunction. However, evidence of cognitive impairment in CFS patients has been found in some, but not other, studies. This heterogeneity in findings may stem from the relative presence of mental fatigue in the patient populations examined. The present study assessed this possibility in a population-based sample of CFS patients. In all, 43 patients with CFS defined by the criteria of the 1994 research case definition using measurements recommended by the 2003 International CFS Study Group, and 53 age-, sex-, and race/ethnicity-matched nonfatigued subjects were included in the study. Mental fatigue was assessed using the mental fatigue subscale of the multidimensional fatigue inventory. Cognitive function was evaluated using an automated battery of computerized tests (Cambridge neuropsychological test automated battery (CANTAB)) that assessed psychomotor function, planning and problem-solving abilities, and memory and attentional performance. CFS patients with significant complaints of mental fatigue (score of mental fatigue 2 standard deviations above the mean of nonfatigued subjects) exhibited significant impairment in the spatial working memory and sustained attention (rapid visual information processing) tasks when compared to CFS patients with low complaints of mental fatigue and nonfatigued subjects. In CFS patients with significant mental fatigue, sustained attention performance was impaired only in the final stages of the test, indicating greater cognitive fatigability in these patients. CFS patients with low mental fatigue displayed performance comparable to nonfatigued subjects on all tests of the CANTAB battery. These findings show strong concordance between subjective complaints of mental fatigue and objective measurement of cognitive impairment in CFS patients and suggest that mental fatigue is an important component of CFS-related cognitive dysfunction.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 94%

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 89%

Cognitive Dysfunction Relates to Subjective Report of Mental Fatigue in Patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Capuron

Welberg

Heim

et al. 2006

Neuropsychopharmacol

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“…This finding therefore supports those of other authors who have also provided objective evidence for poor attention within the CFS population (McDonald et al 1993 ;Ray et al 1993 ;Sandman et al 1993 ;Cope et al 1995 ;Marshall et al 1997 ;Johnson et al 1998). The impairment the CFS group showed in attention was not accounted for by differences in mood.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Neuropsychological functioning, illness perception, mood and quality of life in chronic fatigue syndrome, autoimmune thyroid disease and healthy participants

2009

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Background. This study attempted to longitudinally investigate neuropsychological function, illness representations, self-esteem, mood and quality of life (QoL) in individuals with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and compared them with both healthy participants and a clinical comparison group of individuals with autoimmune thyroid disease (AITD).Method. Neuropsychological evaluation was administered at two time points, five weeks apart. Twenty-one individuals with CFS, 20 individuals with AITD and 21 healthy participants were matched for age, pre-morbid intelligence, education level and socio-economic status (SES). All groups also completed measures of illness perceptions, mood, self-esteem and QoL at both time points.Results. The CFS group showed significantly greater impairment on measures of immediate and delayed memory, attention and visuo-constructional ability, and reported significantly higher levels of anxiety and depression. After controlling for the effects of mood, the CFS group still demonstrated significant impairment in attention. The CFS group also reported significantly lower self-reported QoL than the AITD and healthy participants. In terms of illness perceptions, the AITD group believed that their condition would last longer, that they had more treatment control over their condition, and reported less concern than the CFS group.Conclusions. These results suggest that the primary cognitive impairment in CFS is attention and that this is not secondary to affective status. The lower treatment control perceptions and greater illness concerns that CFS patients report may be causally related to their affective status.

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“…In contrast to increased physical symptoms after exercise, cognitive function did not deteriorate over time although many studies have reported impairment in cognitive function at baseline (22)(23)(24) or after exercise (11,12,25) for patients with CFS. The reason for this discrepancy may relate to our use of the continuous performance test in this study although one of our previous studies showed that exercise did not alter cognitive function (26).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 82%

A real-time assessment of the effect of exercise in chronic fatigue syndrome

Yoshiuchi

Cook

Ohashi

et al. 2007

Physiology & Behavior

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Patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) report substantial symptom worsening after exercise. However, the time course over which this develops has not been explored. Therefore, the objective of this study was to investigate the influence of exercise on subjective symptoms and on cognitive function in CFS patients in natural settings using a computerized ecological momentary assessment method, which allowed us to track the effects of exercise within and across days. Subjects were 9 female patients with CFS and 9 healthy women. A watch-type computer was used to collect real time data on physical and psychological symptoms and cognitive function for one week before and two weeks after a maximal exercise test. For each variable, we investigated temporal changes after exercise using multilevel modeling. Following exercise, physical symptoms did get worse but not until a five-day delay in CFS patients. Despite this, there was no difference in the temporal pattern of changes in psychological symptoms or in cognitive function after exercise between CFS patients and controls. In conclusion, physical symptoms worsened after a several day delay in patients with CFS following exercise while psychological symptoms or cognitive function did not change after exercise.

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Cognitive Slowing and Working Memory Difficulties in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Abstract: It is concluded that, although CFS and major depression and dysthymia have distinct clinical features, these disorders have slowed motor and cognitive processing speed in common.

Cited by 92 publications

References 33 publications

Cognitive Dysfunction Relates to Subjective Report of Mental Fatigue in Patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Cognitive Dysfunction Relates to Subjective Report of Mental Fatigue in Patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Neuropsychological functioning, illness perception, mood and quality of life in chronic fatigue syndrome, autoimmune thyroid disease and healthy participants

A real-time assessment of the effect of exercise in chronic fatigue syndrome

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