Discuss the psychological connection between wellness and illness f Jim Malone in the Melissa Schorr article, do you think stress really affect physical health?
Review the case “Is It All in My Head,” page 74. Discuss the psychological connection between wellness and illness of Jim Malone in the Melissa Schorr article, do you think stress really affect physical health?
"Anybody who has a chronic illness has alterations in bio- HEAVEN CAN WAIT logical and psychological mechanisms," says James F. Jones, Doctors told Jim Malone M.D., a chronic fatigue expert with the U.S. Centers for Disease he had HIV. Their mistake Control and Prevention. "You really can’t separate the brain and nearly killed him. the body, because psychology is biology-everything that takes place in the brain is chemical or electrical. You can’t have the BEING TOLD you’re ill one without the other." can actually make you sick. Just ask Jim Malone, a DIAGNOSIS BY DEFAULT Californian who recently For the estimated 800,000 Americans suffering from chronic found out, to his shock, that fatigue and the 3 to 6 million with fibromyalgia, the symptoms he was not, in fact, about to are all too physical-as debilitating as flu, and as persistent as die of AIDS. tuberculosis. The diseases disproportionately affect women: In 1996, Malone tested Nearly 90 percent of fibromyalgia patients, and two-thirds of positive for HIV. A second, CFS sufferers, are female. Patients diagnosed with chronic confirmation test came back fatigue have endured six months of complete exhaustion, plus a negative-but somehow, cluster of debilitating symptoms: They grow forgetful. Hurt nobody ever told him the when they swallow. Suffer throbbing headaches. Toss and turn good news. Believing that he had HIV, Malone in their sleep. Those with fibromyalgia may also suffer fatigue, developed the symptoms of the disease. He knew but mainly describe inexplicably aching joints and muscles what to expect, since he’d cared for two lovers who across their entire body. had died from it. Just like someone with AIDS, he But although these diseases are among the more extensively had severe digestive problems and diarrhea. He researched of these chronic disorders, patients may still flounder began to waste away. Convinced he was going to for years searching for an explanation. Symptoms are broad and die, he isolated himself. diffuse, and the diseases have no reliable test, so a diagnosis is In August 2004, a new computer system flagged usually made by ruling out everything else. the mismatch in his medical records, and a follow-up In the search for the cause, researchers have turned up some HIV test revealed he did not have the virus after all. significant biological abnormalities among chronic fatigue sufferers: Malone was stunned, then jubilant-then angry. He Stress hormones, brain scans and immune system measures often says he’s making up for lost time-and has also filed show characteristic differences compared to healthier popula- a legal claim against his health-care providers. tions. Researchers haven’t given up looking for an underlying Malone now talks about his ordeal with matter-of- infectious cause, since sickness can be misleading-asthma and fact humor-glad to be alive, and newly appreciative ulcers, for example, were only recently understood to be primarily of the power of mind over matter. physical diseases. At one point, the Epstein-Barr virus, which "I had the symptoms. Some of the problems I had infects nearly all adults, was thought to be a culprit in CFS or were exactly like the problems that they [his HIV- fibromyalgia. But this early lead, and others, have fizzled. positive lovers] had had. The loss of appetite and the other things were exactly the same. If you keep having someone telling you that you have cancer, or ACCEPTING THAT a brain tumor, and they tell you enough times, you PSYCHOLOGY PLAYS A ROLE start believing it. DOES NOT MEAN PATIENTS "I’ve had lots of people ask me, how do I feel now? SHOULD JUST BE ABLE TO That’s an awfully hard question to answer. Just glad "WILL" THEMSELVES OUT to feel that I didn’t have a virus that would kill me. A OF ILLNESS. month or so after I was told that I wasn’t positive, my health started turning around. I’ve gained about 40 pounds since August. Physically, I feel pretty Doctors suspect that by continuing to focus on an elusive bio- good. Emotionally, I feel pretty good. But it doesn’t logical cause, they could be missing out on the other half of the take much to put me on a soapbox, to rail against picture-and the chance to find a solution. They have begun to re- those people who made the mistake. examine the role of severe stress, depression and even personality "Now, I have the normal aches and pains that traits in initiating and fostering disease. PHOTO: DARRYL BUSH/SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE anyone approaching 60 would have. I accept those- Some of the evidence is hard to dispute. For example, those grudgingly. It gives me more insight into what these suffering from chronic fatigue or fibromyalgia are significantly guys who are actually sick are going through. I have more likely than healthy people to have experienced depression, more empathy with people who are actually sick." anxiety, physical abuse or a life-altering stressful event well -Kathleen McGowan before they developed their disease. In one study conducted by Wayne Katon, professor of psychiatry at the University of 74 Psychology Today May/June 2005
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