News From Jarred Younger / Neuroinflammation, Pain, and Fatigue Laboratory at UAB, From Aug 2020

mango said:
However, he mentions in this video that the first CFS patient he's testing has to have PEM (at 4:53 min).
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Thanks for highlighting that!

ETA - If he is requiring PEM in all patients, he will hopefully update the info in clinicaltrials.gov. On the other hand, if he is using Fukuda, hopefully he will subset out on those with PEM versus not and report those separately
 
Medfeb said:
If he is requiring PEM in all patients, he will hopefully update the info in clinicaltrials.gov. On the other hand, if he is using Fukuda, hopefully he will subset out on those with PEM versus not and report those separately
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I can't quote him exactly, but he mentioned starting with well-characterised patients with no potentially confounding diagnoses. From what I understand, there's a fair bit riding on this experiment for one of his hypotheses about ME and he'll only be able to scan so many people at this stage, so he's likely to go for clear cases.

Hopefully it'll either show something is going on or be clearly negative. That's probably optimistic, given how confusing most results seem to be, but we can hope!
 
mango said:
https://www.youtube.com/view?v=OlpFPCwAyOc
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@5:18 He states that almost all his Fibromyalgia patients met the criteria for CFS which I strongly doubt since Fibromyalgia patients tend to report improving from light exercise where as ME patients deteriorate. See:
Code: 
https://old.reddit.com/r/Fibromyalgia/comments/174ur61/the_pain_is_different_with_exercise/
 
DigitalDrifter said:
@5:18 He states that almost all his Fibromyalgia patients met the criteria for CFS which I strongly doubt since Fibromyalgia patients tend to report improving from light exercise where as ME patients deteriorate. See:
Code: 
https://old.reddit.com/r/Fibromyalgia/comments/174ur61/the_pain_is_different_with_exercise/
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I see a crapton of people with FM, and on this sub, reporting PEM. We're mostly stuck with diagnoses based largely on what individual MDs fancy or happen to believe in, rather than what the patients are actually reporting. It's impossible to say what is valid and what isn't in terms of differences. Plenty of long haulers are also diagnosed with FM. It's a huge mess.
 
"Here is a quick update about my efforts to test dextronaltrexone in chronic pain, fatigue, and cognitive disorders related to brain inflammation. This substance has never been trialed in humans, and I want to tell you why it needs to be prioritized. - Jarred Younger"

 
mango said:
"Here is a quick update about my efforts to test dextronaltrexone in chronic pain, fatigue, and cognitive disorders related to brain inflammation. This substance has never been trialed in humans, and I want to tell you why it needs to be prioritized. - Jarred Younger"
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I added a page to MEpedia for Dextro-naltrexone, basically summarizing what he said in the video.
 
Medfeb said:
Unfortunately, these studies are still using Fukuda to select patients. Lots of money and time spent on an outdated definition that doesn't require PEM
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It seems like he might use a modified Fukuda in his studies which requires PEM.

This 2019 study from his lab says "participants with ME/CFS had to meet the following inclusion criteria: (i) age between 18–55 years; (ii) met Fukuda case definition criteria for ME/CFS (Fukuda et al., 1994), without the Reeves et al. (2005) modifications but with additional criteria proposed by Jason et al. (2010);".

And that Jason et al. paper gives an ME/CFS criteria whose second requirement is:

"Post-exertional malaise and/ or post-exertional fatigue. With activity (it need not be strenuous and may include walking up a flight of stairs,
using a computer, or reading a book), there must be a loss of physical or mental stamina, rapid/sudden muscle or cognitive fatigability, post-
exertional malaise and/or fatigue and a tendency for other associated symptoms within the patient’s cluster of symptoms to worsen. The
recovery is slow, often taking 2-24 hours or longer."
 
"I believe microglia are the primary culprit behind fibromyalgia, ME/CFS, Gulf War Illness, Long-COVID, and other chronic pain and fatigue disorders. Here is a quick video on what I am trying to do to fix the problem. - Jarred Younger"

 
"Pathogens, environmental exposures, medications, and your physical and mental states are all potential sensitizers of microglia. In this video, I cover the most likely triggers of chronic brain inflammation. - Jarred Younger"

 
"A new study suggests that fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) can significantly reduce fibromyalgia pain, fatigue, and mood problems. I want to share what I think about the study, and what needs to happen next. The link to the paper is below. I don't think the complete paper is open-access, but if you search the title with Google, you may find it posted somewhere. - Jarred Younger

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38663650/ "

 
mango said:
"A new study suggests that fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) can significantly reduce fibromyalgia pain, fatigue, and mood problems. I want to share what I think about the study, and what needs to happen next. The link to the paper is below. I don't think the complete paper is open-access, but if you search the title with Google, you may find it posted somewhere. - Jarred Younger

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38663650/ "

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Link to S4ME thread on paper

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Younger also mentioned that a group in the UK is planning a study testing FMT in ME/CFS. I couldn't find it in the UK trial registry (don't know how comprehensive that is compared to the US registry) but SolveME's site has a
page about it:

Study Summary

Premature immune ageing could explain immune dysfunction in ME/CFS. Gut microbes may contribute to the chronic activation of the immune system in ME/CFS patients by gaining access to the blood and immune cells because of a leaky gut wall which allows microbes and their products to access internal organs. Disturbances in gut microbe population and an imbalance of “good microbes” versus “bad microbes” that can accompany a leaky gut have been described in ME/CFS patients. Therapies which replenish health promoting gut microbes can restore immune function in the elderly and therefore are an attractive treatment option for ME/CFS. One such therapy is fecal microbe transplantation (FMT) – the transfer of stool microbes from a healthy person to a person with an abnormal population of gut microbes.

A clinical trial will assess the efficacy of FMT in ME/CFS patients and we will have access to trial participants and samples obtained as part of the trial. Using blood samples from trial participants we will investigate premature immune ageing in ME/CFS patients and determine whether FMT is able to restore immune function in ME/CFS patients and whether this affects symptoms. This is important both for understanding the role of the immune system in ME/CFS, and to understand a mechanism by which FMT could improve quality of life for people with ME/CFS.
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"Hello everyone! I'm busy wrapping up a grant application and just wanted to give a quick update on my remote clinical trials. Next week I will be presenting a new treatment approach for chronic pain, headaches, and anxiety. - Jarred Younger"

 
Ahem.

I'd place bets that people get better results from actually being in natural green environments rather than a green light (will make money for someone) therapy, but I may be prejudiced.

My medical reporter father hid in a garbage can in the 1950s at a chiropractic convention where red light was the promoted miracle cure.
 
Sorry @mango for taking your video posting job this week!



AI generated summary:

"The video discusses the lab's top 8 research priorities for the second half of 2024:

1. Botanical trial for Gulf War Illness:
- Remote trial looking at curcumin, stinging nettle, and R-lipoic acid
- Open to participants from anywhere in the US
- About halfway through the trial, laying groundwork for future remote trials

2. Zirconium-89 oxine PET study:
- Tracks leukocytes infiltrating the brain and causing inflammation
- Done in collaboration with Jonathan McConathy and Suzanne Lapi
- Healthy controls completed, starting to run ME/CFS patients

3. DPA-714 PET study:
- Shows when microglia in the brain are activated and inflamed
- Aims to determine if ME/CFS patients have inflamed brains
- ME/CFS patients completed, 4-5 healthy controls left
- Funded by NIH

4. Brain inflammation MRI study:
- Looks at brain temperature and lactate as signs of inflammation
- Almost done, trying to finish in second half of 2024
- Also NIH funded

5. Psilocybin for fibromyalgia pain clinical trial:
- Giving macro doses of psilocybin to fibromyalgia patients
- Investigating if it changes serotonergic systems to reduce pain
- Most will run in second half of 2024

6. Weather and pollutant effects on ME/CFS study:
- By graduate student Chloe Jones
- Correlates daily fatigue ratings with weather/pollutant data
- Preliminary results show some variables fluctuate with good/bad days

7. Developing dextro-naltrexone:
- Aim to create more powerful version of low-dose naltrexone
- Hoping to start the project this year
- Complicated as never used in humans before

8. Whole genome sequencing for ME/CFS:
- Run by Liz Worthey and Camille Birch, funded by Solve ME
- Identifies genetic variants likely driving a patient's primary symptoms
- First project finished, pending peer review, likely published by end of year
- Hope to eventually offer to anyone with mysterious pain/fatigue/cognitive issues"
 
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