A Causal-Pathway Phenotype of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome due to Hemodialysis in Patients with End-Stage Renal Disease, 2022, Asad, Maes et al

Background. End-stage renal disease (ESRD) is associated with fatigue and physio-somatic symptoms.

Objective. To delineate the associations between severity of fatigue and physio-somatic symptoms and glomerular filtration rate, inflammatory biomarkers, and Wnt/catenin-pathway proteins.

Methods. The Wnt-pathway related proteins β-catenin, Dickkopf-related protein 1 (DKK1), R-spondin-1, and sclerostin were measured by ELISA technique in 60 ESRD patients and 30 controls. The Fibromyalgia and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (FF) Rating Scale was used to assess the severity of FF symptoms.

Results. ESRD is characterized by a significant increase in the total FF score, muscle tension, fatigue, sadness, sleep disorders, gastro-intestinal (GI) symptoms, and a flu-like malaise. The total-FF score was significantly correlated with serum levels of urea, creatinine, and copper (positively), and β-catenin, eGFR, hemoglobin, albumin, and zinc (inversely). The total-FF score was associated with the number of total dialysis and weekly dialysis sessions, and these dialysis characteristics were more important in predicting FF scores than eGFR measurements. Partial Least Squares analysis showed that the FF score comprised two factors that are differently associated with biomarkers: a) 43.0% of the variance in fatigue, GI symptoms, muscle tension, sadness, and insomnia is explained by hemoglobin, albumin, zinc, β-catenin, and R-spondin-1; and b) 22.3% of the variance in irritability, concentration and memory impairments by increased copper and cations/chloride ratio, and male sex.

Conclusion. ESRD patients show high levels of fatigue and physio-somatic symptoms, which are associated with hemodialysis and mediated by dialysis-induced changes in inflammatory pathways, the Wnt/catenin pathway, and copper.

Paywall, https://www.eurekaselect.com/article/122161

 

The relevance to "CFS" seems doubtful to me, but happy to be corrected.

 

It might be a coincidence but there was a recent study which found a possible association between ME/CFS and the TPPP gene. If one looks at the results of genome wide association studies for this gene, glomerular filtration rate comes up repeatedly.

https://www.ebi.ac.uk/gwas/genes/TPPP

The authors mention β-catenin. This is closely related to cadherins which came out as strongly associated with ME/CFS in a proteomics study by Hanson et al. I don't understand why β-catenin is relevant to kidney disease but that it comes up might be another hint that similar changes are occurring in these two illnesses.

My understanding is roughly that cadherins are physically attached to β-catenin on one end (the other end sticks out of the cell membrane). The β-catenin is then physically attached to the cell skeleton.

 

Since SEID, the CDC and the NICE guidelines no one should be talking about CFS anymore. The criteria for CFS are so loose that any research like this tells us very little about ME or dialysis.

It may or may not be ME, we don't know and if we have to try to guess whether this has any relevance for ME/CFS it is rubbish research.

It is perfectly valid to talk about fatigue, even calling it chronic fatigue but you can't relate it to a specific disease unless you have properly defined that disease according to the latest research into that patient population.