Is ME A NeuroMuscular Disorder?

[duncan]

PEM and cognitive issues may suggest not, but is it just a function of not knowing enough?

https://www.mda.org/disease/list

 

[Peter T]

There is/are form(s) of Motor Neurone Disease (ALS) that involve cognitive impairment, though it/they tend to have a more rapid progression than the more classic presentation.

I worked with one MND patient who had an unusually slow progression, not unlike Prof Stephen Hawking. Then a [further] member of the family got MND, and they thought yes we know what to expect, but within a few months the relative developed dementia and died.

I must admit in the early stages of my ME [pre diagnosis], this was one of the possibilities I considered for my own condition. My work experience had been largely with degenerative neuromuscular conditions, and it was only when my neurological symptoms showed periods of remission as with my other symptom that I began to relax about possible diagnoses.

 

[duncan]

There is/are form(s) of Motor Neurone Disease (ALS) that involve cognitive impairment, though it/they tend to have a more rapid progression than the more classic presentation.

I worked with one MND patient who had an unusually slow progression, not unlike Prof Stephen Hawking. Then a member of the family got MND, and they thought yes we know what to expect, but within a few months the relative developed dementia and died.

Yes. Still, ME doesn't always have to be degenerative, ie,a dystophy. Perhaps it's an acquired myositis? Or even a genetic-based NM disease triggered by a virus/bacteria/parasite?

I think we need to look to symptoms, and admit they are calling this in real-time. No one knows much about anything. My wife has ATS (a rare NM manifestation) and she could pass easily - and likely would - for an ME/CFS patient were it not for a sliver of a mutant gene that only relatively recently was acknowledged.