Neurobehavioral deficits associated with chronic fatigue syndrome in veterans with Gulf War unexplained illnesses

Abstract

Gulf War unexplained illnesses (GWUI) are a heterogeneous collection of symptoms of unknown origin known to be more common among veterans of the Gulf War than among nonveterans. In the present study we focused on one of these unexplained illnesses. We tested the hypothesis that in a sample of Persian Gulf War veterans chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) was associated with cognitive deficits on computerized cognitive testing after controlling for the effects of premorbid cognitive differences. We obtained Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT) data acquired around the date of induction into the military on 94 veterans of the Gulf War, 32 with CFS and 62 healthy controls. Controls performed better than participants diagnosed with CFS on the AFQT. Cognitive deficits were associated with CFS on 3 of 8 variables after the effect of premorbid AFQT scores was removed with ANCOVA. (JINS, 2001, 7, 835–839.)

Neuropsychological Findings in Gulf War Illness: A Review

“…Regression analyses also demonstrated poorer retention in association with subjective memory complaints. These results contrast with previous research (Binder et al, 2001; White et al, 2001) that did not find a connection between subjective complaints and objective impairment. Chao (2017) concluded that subjective memory complaints are sensitive to neuropsychological deficits and, as subjective memory complaints are linked to dementia risk, a necessary component of GW neuropsychological assessment.…”

“…Binder et al (2001) investigated cognitive performance in symptomatic GW veterans ( n = 94) as defined by chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). Groups were divided based on CFS criteria (Fukuda et al, 1994) with 32 participants comprising the case group and 62 participants comprising the control group.…”

Scientific & review committee

“…Despite significant challenges, human testing for the neurotoxic effects of occupational exposures to chemicals is steadily advancing (104)(105)(106)(107). These procedures have also been used to examine the neurotoxic effects of the stress and hazards of war (108,109), which demonstrates broadening utility and acceptance of these testing procedures. The World Health Organization (WHO) recommended a neurobehavioral test battery for humans (110) and test batteries for assessing children (111).…”

The impact of the 1991 Gulf War on the mind and brain: findings from neuropsychological and neuroimaging research

“…The Portland Environmental Hazards Research Centre published a series of studies that built on each other as their cohort of GW veterans from the US Pacific Northwest grew (Anger et al 1999;Storzbach et al 2000;Binder et al 2001;Storzbach et al 2001). The neuropsychological studies sampled for symptomatic and asymptomatic subgroups, which were based on health survey responses combined with clinical examinations that permitted exclusion of medically explainable health symptoms.…”

“…However, Gulf-and Germany-deployed participants did not differ on the TOMM, and rates of clinically significant sub-optimal performances were extremely low in both groups. Similarly, although the Portland group consistently found GW veterans with high-symptom complaints to perform more poorly than healthy controls on a forced-choice test of motivation, attention and memory (the Oregon Dual Task Procedure; Anger et al 1999;Binder et al 2001), performances fell within the range of adequate effort, and group differences were interpreted to reflect impairment of cognitive processes other than effort. Thus, when findings are taken together, insufficient effort does not appear to explain neuropsychological deficits in GW veterans.…”