EUROPEAN NETWORK of FIBROMYALGIA ASSOCIATIONS

From the News Desk of Jeanne Hambleton

PRESS RELEASE -28.01.2009

 

The European Medicines Agency (EMEA) are to  have a consultation with a delegation from the European Network of Fibromyalgia Associations (ENFA) in an attempt to understand the need for medical treatments for fibromyalgia in Europe.

Brussels – Following an invitation by the EMEA, the European Network of Fibromyalgia Associations (ENFA) has agreed to attend a consultation meeting with EMEA, where ENFA representatives will share their knowledge and experiences related to the disease of Fibromyalgia that some 14 million Europeans are suffering from.  One of the biggest challenges that the patients have been facing is the lack of officially recognized medical treatment options in the European Union whereas there are three drugs in the United States of America approved by the Food and Drug Administration: Cymbalta from Eli Lilly, Lyrica from Pfizer and recently authorised Savella from Forest & Cypress.

 

The European Declaration 69/2008 on Fibromyalgia that has been recently adopted by the European Parliament, symbolizing the awareness raised around Fibromyalgia, calls for actions on specific issues from European Institutions to improve healthcare surrounding the disease, e.g. investment in research and provision of better diagnosis and treatment.  In addition, the European Health Commissioner Ms. Vassiliou’s remarks (E-6262/08EN) on the treatment of Fibromyalgia demonstrates encouraging willingness of the European Commission to address various concerns laid out in the Declaration on Fibromyalgia.

“We hope that this new drive on Fibromyalgia awareness will bring the end to the impasse of medical treatment for Fibromyalgia patients in the EU”, said Mr. Robert Boelhouwer, President of ENFA. 

Fibromyalgia is a complex disease with a variety of symptoms in addition to the defining symptom – chronic widespread pain. It is estimated that 14 million people in Europe suffer from fibromyalgia and the condition is more prevalent with women (87%).  Fibromyalgia imposes large economic burdens on society as well as on affected individuals. The debilitating symptoms often result in lost work days, lost income and disability payments. Due to lack of awareness, on average patients in Europe see 3-4 physicians and take multiple medications over the course of several years before they receive a diagnosis of Fibromyalgia.

Mr. Boelhouwer said, “Increasing awareness of Fibromyalgia among healthcare professionals and patients will bring enormous benefits to patients, healthcare providers and the society in general by managing the burden of the disease.” he continues, “Having this in mind, ENFA welcomes the proactive role that both the European Parliament and the European Commission have taken up in raising the awareness of Fibromyalgia.”

 

 

Contact:  European Network of Fibromyalgia Associations (ENFA)

Mr. Robert Boelhouwer President of ENFA

contact@enfa-europe.eu  - www.enfa-europe.eu

 About ENFA

ENFA is a network of patient association and support groups working in close consultation with the national association in the relevant country. Our joint missions are to conquer the myths and misunderstandings around Fibromyalgia. The network will help collectively push forward the boundaries which currently exist in understanding, experiencing and treatment of Fibromyalgia. Our main goal is to see fibromyalgia receiving the recognition it deserves across Europe as an illness in its own right.

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http://www.europarl.europa.eu/QP-WEB/application/home.do?language=EN

 

 

Stress, depression high among Canadian peacekeepers

By Communications Staff

Thursday, December 13, 2007 Canada’s peacekeepers suffer similar rates of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorders (PTSD) as combat, war-zone soldiers, according to a London, Ont. research team.
Psychiatrist J. Donald Richardson and his co-investigators also found that PTSD rates and severity were associated with younger age, single marital status and deployment frequency.

Richardson is a consultant psychiatrist with the Operational Stress Injury Clinic at Parkwood Hospital, part of St. Joseph’s Health Care, London and a professor with the Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry at The University of Western Ontario.

His team conducted a random, national survey of more than 1,000 Canadian peacekeeping veterans with service-related disabilities. The participants were below the age of 65 and had served with the Canadian Forces from 1990 to 1999.

The research, published in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, found a third of veterans deployed more than once suffered probable clinical depression, and 30 per cent of those deployed one time were affected.

The rates of probable PTSD were 11 per cent for those deployed once and 15 per cent for those deployed more than once. The authors also found peacekeepers were more likely to have PTSD and more severe symptoms if they were young, single, or had multiple deployments.

“This study has important clinical implications because understanding such risk factors can help predict potential psychiatric problems in veterans who have been deployed,” says Richardson.

“The high rates of depression observed in deployed veterans can have a significant impact when they seek treatment for PTSD because depression must be aggressively treated to help patients respond more effectively to psychotherapy.”

“Many veterans are also living and working in the community as civilians, therefore it is important that primary care physicians and psychiatrists become more knowledgeable about the emotional impact of military deployment and screen for possible PTSD,” says Richardson.

The Operational Stress Injury Clinic is funded by Veterans Affairs Canada and provides specialized services to help veterans and members of the Canadian Forces deal with PTSD, anxiety, depression or addiction resulting from military service.

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Coping styles in fibromyalgia: effect of co-morbid posttraumatic stress disorder.

Ablin JN, Cohen H, Neumann L, Kaplan Z, Buskila D.
Institute of Rheumatology, Tel-Aviv Sourasky Medical Center and Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel-Aviv University, 6 Weizman St., Tel-Aviv, 64239, Israel, ajacob@post.tau.ac.il.

To analyze coping styles of fibromyalgia (FM) patients with specific emphasis on differences in coping styles between fibromyalgia patients with and without post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Seventy-seven consecutive patients (40 women and 37 men) who fulfilled ACR criteria for FM, and 48 healthy controls, completed questionnaires measuring prevalence and severity of PTSD symptoms, including the structured clinical interview for DSM-III-R-non-patient edition (SCID-NP) and the clinician administered PTSD scale (CAPS). Subjects were divided into two groups based on the presence or absence of PTSD symptoms. Subsequently, coping styles were measured using the Albert Einstein College of Medicine (AECOM) Coping Style Questionnaire. Student t tests were used to compare the means of quantitative variables, and proportions were compared by Chi square tests. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to compare the scores of the FM patients with and without PTSD, as well as to estimate the effect of gender on psychiatric variables. FM patients exhibit significantly higher levels of suppression (P < 0.00001), help-seeking (P < 0.007), replacement (P < 0.003), substitution (P < 0.002), and reversal (P < 0.004) compared with healthy controls. FM patients with PTSD and without PTSD differed significantly only on the suppression subscale (P < 0.02). FM patients that have PTSD presented higher suppression scores compared to FM patients without PTSD. No significant difference was noted on scales of minimization, help-seeking, replacement, blame, substitution, mapping, and reversal. Our results have delineated coping patterns of FM patients, identifying suppression, help-seeking, replacement, substitution and replacement as strategies more common among these patients. We further identified suppression as the only coping style significantly more common among FM patients with co-morbid PTSD then among FM patients without such a diagnosis. Our results may serve to further characterize cognitive and behavioral aspects of FM patients and subsequently guide therapeutic interventions.

PMID: 18058105 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

1: Rheumatol Int. 2007 Dec 6 [Epub ahead of print]

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