The Impact of Mono On Teens

Teens are fair game for mononucleosis, which tends to lead to chronic fatigue syndrome. What is the price of chronic fatigue in our teenagers? The authors of a new study claim that lingering fatigue may cause teens to push themselves much too hard.

During the course of a brand new study, scientists followed 301 teenagers who had mononucleosis, a virus that tends to precede chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) in adolescents. Six months after the teens had been diagnosed with mononucleosis, 39 of the teens were found to have chronic fatigue syndrome. This group was then compared to another 39 study participants who had been confirmed as having mononucleosis but had come to a full recovery at the end of six months. These two groups were then studied over a period of a further two more years.

High Price

By the end of the study, the researchers could discern no significant difference between the two groups in terms of the amount of physical activity they undertook prior to, during, or in the days after the infection. But the teens afflicted with chronic fatigue syndrome were sleeping more during daylight hours and experienced much higher levels of fatigue. This suggests they were paying a very high price for forcing themselves to stay as active as their peers.

Mysterious Condition

This study was published in the September 2010 issue of Archives of Child & Adolescent Medicine alongside many other studies on chronic fatigue syndrome as it manifests in adolescents. Chronic fatigue syndrome is a controversial and mysterious condition that is thought to affect 1.3%-4.4% of all U.S. adolescents.

Another of the articles published in the journal discussed the importance of gaining some understanding about the disorder so that effective treatment might be provided to sufferers. One study consisting of 54 adolescent chronic fatigue syndrome sufferers found that half of them were recovered after a period of two years, while the remainder of the teens still suffered severe fatigue and physical impairment.

A third study compared 25 kids suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome with 23 healthy peers and discovered many differences in the blood work of the two sets of kids. Those kids with chronic fatigue syndrome were found to have differences in their white blood cells along with higher levels of C-reactive protein and cholesterol. Both of these are markers that suggest oxidative stress, which leads to cell damage. The CFS kids also displayed lower values for vitamins C and E which are known antioxidants that serve to protect cells from stress. 

These findings appear to suggest some kind of detectable immune system abnormalities that underlie the CFS condition, say the study authors. This finding may lead to new avenues of research which might lead to better treatments or even a cure for chronic fatigue syndrome. Scientists at the National Institutes of Health are also exploring the link between chronic fatigue syndrome and the xenotropic murine leukemia virus (XMLV).