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by Janet Mizrahi
October 16, 2000
(Editor’s Note: We want you to know how your purchase funds research. This is one of a series of articles that will keep you informed about how, by purchasing quality products from the CFIDS and FM Health Resource and ImmuneSupport.com, you help to conquer these devastating diseases.)
How Your Purchase Funds Research
Every purchase you make from ImmuneSupport.com and the CIFDS and FM Health Resource helps support research into CFIDS and FM. How? Whether or not we as a private company make a profit, ImmuneSupport.com and the CFIDS and FM Health contributes quarterly to organizations dedicated to finding a cure for these life-altering conditions.
Proceeds from your purchases go to worthy organizations like the CFIDS Association of America. We recently spoke with K. Kimberly Kenney, the president of the CIFDS Association, who updated us about the group’s activities.
Health Resource Donations Support CFIDS Association of America
The CFIDS Association’s mission is quite simple -- it wants to conquer CFIDS.
To meet its goal, the Association operates on several fronts: Education, Public Policy, and Research. Specific projects they are working on now include the CIFDS name change, obtaining more CDC and NIH funding for research, and a new initiative to expand health care providers’ understanding of CFIDS on a clinical level.
Funding Research
The Association also funds research. They recently funded a Dr. Nancy Klimas’s research at the University of Miami. However Kenney explains that recently the type of groups the Association funds has changed dramatically. “We are now in the process of shifting our research emphasis away from individual research projects to fund more scientific inquiry through a series of symposia.” The outcome will be to attract more experts in other fields to investigate CFS, she says.
The first symposium, to be held in Washington, D.C., is a closed meeting that will bring together researchers already studying CFIDS with those studying related areas. The topic is orthostatic intolerance, which according to Kenney is a promising area for research.
Orthostatic intolerance is a condition that results from dysfunction in the autonomic nervous system and seems to be present in many with CFIDS. With this condition, retaining upright posture is uncomfortable and can often lead to fainting. It is sort of a disconnect between the brain the heart. When standing upright, the brain in those with orthostatic intolerance seems to tell the heart to pump more blood to the feet. Blood volume increases to the lower extremities, which impacts blood pressure. This affects cognitive ability and other body functions that rely on blood flow.
The symposium hopes to connect scientists already studying this phenomenon with scientists who have an interest in the autonomic nervous system and how it malfunctions in CFS.
Why Research is Critical
Examining many arenas is important because CIFDS has no universal cause and no one treatment works for everyone. Kenney feels that current research into the causes of the ailment should be studied further. She feels investigation into HHV-6 and its relationship to CFIDS is “very interesting and potentially important as to the cause of the syndrome.”
Likewise, Kenney comments that Dr. A. Michael Lerner’s recent reports about the connection between the heart and CFIDS is noteworthy. “I think it’s particularly interesting that he’s finding EBV (Epstein Barr Virus) because that was one of the original culprits in the early 80s when CFS was ‘discovered,’” she says. She adds that his research needs to be replicated since the anti-viral drugs Lerner is using are extremely potent.
To fund the work it does, the CFIDS Association relies on donations from organizations like Health Resource and membership fees from individuals joining the group. And that’s why your purchase helps to fund research, and why together, we’ll find a cure.
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