FM,

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distrubances like exposure to toxins in a WDB

Once, researchers believed that something must be wrong with the muscles of FM

patients because they seemed to be the origin of so much pain and dysfunction.

In fact, FM's former name, " fibrositis " , literally meant inflammation of the

muscles and soft tissue. However, later studies ultimately found no inflammation

or nerve injury. Today, researchers generally concur that FM is a condition

which is centrally mediated by the brain and not a disease of the periphery.

Increasingly, they have identified abnormalities in the levels of various

neurochemicals in the brain. Perhaps best known is the study by I. Jon ,

M.D., Ph.D., of the University of Texas Health Science Center in San ,

which demonstrated that the brain neurochemical Substance P, the agent which

signals the brain to register pain, exists in FM patients at a level that is

three times higher than in normal controls.15 Also of interest is why the

neurotransmitter serotonin, which modifies the intensity of pain signals

entering the brain, appears to be deficient in patients with FM. Many of the

medications currently used to treat fibromyalgia work to counteract this

deficit. As it becomes increasingly clear that there are significant

abnormalities in pain processing in fibromyalgia, researchers are trying to

determine whether the problem is an exaggerated brain/body reaction to basically

normal stimuli (allodynia) or a magnified response to real pain stimuli

(hyperalgesia).16

Recently, a great deal of interest has been directed at the neuroendocrine

system and the abnormal status of such neurotransmitters/neurochemicals as

calcitonin-gene-related peptide, noradrenaline, endorphins, dopamine, histamine,

and GABA. Hormones of the hypothalamus, pituitary, and adrenal glands are

thought to be dysfunctional, too.17 Research by Crofford, M.D., at the

University of Michigan at Ann Arbor suggests that FM is a " stress-associated

syndrome " (since it often occurs following physically or emotionally stressful

events and is also exacerbated by them) with disturbances in the major stress

response systems, the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, the sympathetic

nervous system, and very likely, the autonomic nervous system.18 It also

supports earlier ground-breaking research conducted by , M.D., at

the Oregon Health Sciences University, which found that the growth hormone axis

is abnormal in individuals with FM. Mexican researchers Abud-Mendoza et

al., studied a subset of fibromyalgia patients who didn't respond well to

conventional therapy and found they actually suffered from a form of subclinical

hypothyroidism that was not detected by routine lab tests. The hypothyroidism

was believed to be rooted in a central nervous system dysfunction