Fibromyalgia Update: Genes, Hyperbaric Therapy & Conflicts of Interest Save

An Israeli crossover trial analyzed the efficacy of hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) in 60 patients with fibromyalgia. There were 48 evaluable female patients (24 in the treated group and 24 in crossover group) between 21-67 yrs, with a disease duration of 6.5 yrs. HBOT treatments led to statistically significant improvements in the dolorimeter thresholds,  number of tender points and SF-36 scores (citation source http://url.ie/z1qw).

A cross-sectional study of drug therapy FM randomized clinical trials published between 1997 and 2001 were reviewed. They found the majority of the 47 trials reviewed were pharmaceutical industry-sponsored, and had at least one author with financial conflict of interest (FCOI). Although methodological reporting was suboptimal, they found no evidence that study sample size, industry funding or author's FCOI affected the study outcomes (citation source http://url.ie/z1qz).

The University of Utah analyzed WBC mRNA expression in fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome patients and found that among 34 candidate genes, clusters associated wtih purinergic/cellular modulators and nociception and stress mediators were positively associated with CFS and negatively associated with depression severity, but were not associated with FM. These findings suggest these disorders are genetically different and may require different multimodal approaches in the future (citation source http://url.ie/z1qy).