Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

What is chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS)?

Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is a condition that causes fatigue severe enough to interfere with your ability to participate in normal work, recreational, or social activities. Fatigue caused by CFS does not improve substantially with rest.

Most experts now believe that chronic fatigue syndrome is a distinct physical disease with physical symptoms. Although poorly understood, CFS is quite real and can make functioning normally difficult for many people who have it.

There is evidence that CFS is prevalent among Native Americans and African Americans.

Symptoms

The defining symptom of chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is new, severe fatigue that has lasted at least 6 months and does not improve significantly with rest. The fatigue caused by CFS must be severe enough to interfere with daily work as well as educational, recreational, or social activities. The fatigue and other symptoms described below may begin suddenly over 24 to 48 hours or may develop gradually over weeks or months.

People who have CFS may also have long-term symptoms such as:

Forgetfulness, memory loss, confusion, or difficulty concentrating.
Sore throat.
Tender lymph nodes in the neck or armpits.
Muscle pain.
Joint pain without redness or swelling.
New headaches.
Unrefreshing sleep (waking up feeling tired or unrested).
Fatigue that lasts more than 24 hours after exercise or exertion at a level that you were able to do in the past without fatigue.

What Increases Your Risk

Although people with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) are twice as likely to be women as men and are generally 25 to 45 years of age, there are no factors that have been clearly proven to increase a person's risk for developing chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS).1 However, one study showed that people who have had mononucleosis and severe viral infections that require hospitalization had higher incidence of CFS.6

Sources: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Healthwise and WebMD