Subject: Gulf War Syndrome Veterans Have Damage in Specific Portion of Nervous System

[MORTARDUDE]

Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 21:53:11 EDT
From: Magnu96196@aol.com
Subject: Gulf War Syndrome Veterans Have Damage in Specific Portion of Nervous System




Gulf War Syndrome Veterans Have Damage in Specific Portion of Nervous System

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Medical News Keywords
GULF WAR SYNDROME ROBERT HALEY PARASYMPATHETIC NERVOUS SYSTEM GALLBLADDER
DISEASE UNREFRESHING SLEEP DEPRESSION JOINT PAIN CHRONIC DIARRHEA SEXUAL
DYSFUNCTION EPIDEMIOLOGY
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Description

UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas researchers have uncovered damage in
a specific, primitive portion of the nervous systems of veterans suffering
from Gulf War syndrome.



Newswise ? UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas researchers have
uncovered damage in a specific, primitive portion of the nervous systems of
veterans
suffering from Gulf War syndrome.

UT Southwestern researchers report that damage to the parasympathetic nervous
system may account for nearly half of the typical symptoms ? including
gallbladder disease, unrefreshing sleep, depression, joint pain, chronic
diarrhea
and sexual dysfunction ? that afflict those with Gulf War syndrome. Their
findings will be published in the October issue of the American Journal of
Medicine
and are currently available online.

?The high rate of gallbladder disease in these men, reported in a previous
study, is particularly disturbing because typically women over 40 get this.
It?s
singularly rare in young men,? said Dr. Robert Haley, chief of epidemiology
at UT Southwestern and lead author of the new study.

The parasympathetic system regulates primitive, automatic bodily functions
such as digestion and sleep, while the sympathetic nervous system controls
the ?
fight or flight? instinct.

?They?re sort of the mirror image of each other ? the yin and the yang of
the nervous system ? that control functions we are not usually aware of. This
is
another part of the explanation as to why Gulf War syndrome is so elusive and
mysterious,? said Dr. Haley.

Previously, isolating pure parasympathetic brain function was difficult. In
the new study Dr. Haley and his colleagues used a technique that monitors
changes in approximately 100,000 heartbeats over 24 hours and measures
changes in
high-frequency heart rate variability ? a function solely regulated by the
parasympathetic nervous system.

After plotting the subtle changes in heart function using a mathematical
technique called spectral analysis, researchers found that parasympathetic
brain
function, which usually peaks during sleep, barely changed in veterans with
Gulf War syndrome even though they appeared to be sleeping. In a group of
well
veterans tested for comparison, the brain functions increased normally.

?The parasympathetic nervous system takes care of restorative functions of
the body. During sleep it?s orchestrating that process, which is why we feel
refreshed when we wake up,? Dr. Haley said. ?Its failure to increase at
night in
ill Gulf War veterans may explain their unrefreshing sleep.?

The tests were conducted on 40 members of a Naval Reserve construction
battalion, also known as Seabees. Both ill and healthy veterans from the same
battalion were tested for comparison.

In addition, pure sympathetic nervous system functions were tested. In these
tests, there were no appreciable differences between the two groups of
veterans.

Dr. Haley first described Gulf War syndrome in a series of papers published
in January 1997 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). In
previous studies, Dr. Haley and his colleagues presented evidence attributing
the veterans? illness to low-level exposure to sarin gas ? a potent nerve
toxin ? which drifted over thousands of soldiers when U.S. forces detonated
Iraqi
chemical stores during and after the Gulf War. A recent report from the
Government Accountability Office confirmed that exposure to low-level sarin
in the
1991 Gulf War was more frequent and widespread than previously acknowledged.

Subsequent research from Dr. Haley?s group showed that veterans suffering
from Gulf War syndrome also were born with lower levels of a protective blood
enzyme called paraoxonase, which usually fights off the toxins found in
sarin.
Veterans who were in the same area and did not get sick had higher levels of
this enzyme.

Dr. Haley and his colleagues have closely followed the same group of tests
subjects since 1995. A new grant from the U.S. Department of Defense will
allow
Dr. Haley?s team to undertake a study in a much larger sample of Gulf War
veterans.

Other UT Southwestern researchers involved in the latest study include Drs.
Wanpen Vongpatanasin, assistant professor of internal medicine; Gil Wolfe,
associate professor of neurology; and Ronald Victor, chief of hypertension.
Former
UT Southwestern faculty members Drs. Wilson Bryan, Roseanne Armitage, Robert
Hoffmann, Frederick Petty, and W. Wesley Marshall also contributed to this
study, as did researchers from Phase 5 Sciences and Laboratory Industry
Services,
both in California.

The research was supported by the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel
Command, the U.S. Public Health Service and the Perot Foundation.

A picture to go with this release can be downloaded at:
http://www3.utsouthwestern.edu/home_...news/haley.jpg

The cutline reads:
New findings by Dr. Robert Haley, chief of epidemiology at UT Southwestern
Medical Center at Dallas, reveal damage to the parasympathetic nervous
systems
of veterans of the 1991 Gulf War. Dr. Haley led the study published in the
Oct.
1 edition of the American Journal of Medicine.


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[1IDVET]

Thanks for the info.