The Role of Walking in the Relationship between Catastrophizing and Fatigue in Women with Fibromyalgia, 2022, Sanromán et al

Abstract

Walking is one of the most beneficial treatments for fibromyalgia patients. However, adherence to walking behavior is low due to the initially associated symptoms (including pain and fatigue). Although the association of catastrophism with greater symptoms is known, the results regarding fatigue have not always been consistent. Nevertheless, it is unknown whether the association between catastrophism and fatigue could, in turn, be conditioned by whether the patients walk or not. Therefore, our goal was to explore the moderating effect of walking on the association between catastrophizing and fatigue in patients with fibromyalgia.

A cross-sectional study was carried out with 203 women with fibromyalgia. We used the Multidimensional Fatigue Inventory to assess fatigue and the Pain Catastrophizing Scale to assess pain catastrophizing (differentiating between its three dimensions). An ad hoc item was used to evaluate walking (moderator). Lower scores for fatigue and pain catastrophizing were found among patients who walked versus those who did not. Walking moderated the relationship between rumination and fatigue (Beta = 0.16, t = 1.96, p = 0.049) and between magnification and fatigue (Beta = 0.22, t = 21.83, p = 0.047). Helplessness showed no direct or interaction effect for fatigue. Nevertheless, higher rumination and magnification were associated with higher fatigue only in patients who walked. Therefore, to promote adherence to walking and reduce the effects of catastrophizing on fatigue, it seems necessary to manage rumination and magnification among patients who walk.

Open access, https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/7/4198/htm

 

Manage rumination?

Who are these people??

 

In my n=1 experience of FM, walking causes fatigue. It is not a panacea for pain. It can lift mood. Or it can worsen pain. All depends.

What is their meaning of 'rumination' in this hodge-podge of variables thrown into a statistical soup? They don't say. Is it pain thoughts, general anxiety, what to eat for dinner?

Another Spanish study of walking as a treatment for FM that proves nothing other than an underlying trivialization of fibromyalgia by the authors.

 

This is complete derp. The idea that you can completely detach the life experience of people, in this case pain and other symptoms, from their mental status and motivation is insane. They have all the answers they need right in their hands and they still produce complete derp.

A healthcare professional who simply refuses to understand what patients are reporting and decides instead to fantasize about wild alternative explanations has no place in medicine. This is creating a caricatural version of people, then getting mad at the caricature for being different from reality. This entire pseudoscience industry has to be shut down and it can't be soon enough, it cheapens science by simply existing.