Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is the name currently used by the majority of the medical and scientific community to describe a condition or set of conditions characterized by fatigue and other symptoms. The term is contested, mostly by patients and patient advocacy groups, but also by some doctors. Several of the more common alternative names used to describe what most believe to be the same condition or subtypes include myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), chronic fatigue immune dysfunction syndrome (CFIDS), and post-viral fatigue syndrome (PVFS).
In 1959, E.D. Acheson an early investigator of benign myalgic encephalomyelitis, wrote: "The wisdom of naming a disorder, the nature of which cannot at present be proved, and which may be due to more than one agent, is debatable." The name used to label the condition (or set of conditions) is one of several controversies related to CFS.
Famous quotes containing the words alternative, names, chronic, fatigue and/or syndrome:
“It is a secret from nobody that the famous random event is most likely to arise from those parts of the world where the old adage “There is no alternative to victory” retains a high degree of plausibility.”
—Hannah Arendt (1906–1975)
“Being the dependents of the general government, and looking to its treasury as the source of all their emoluments, the state officers, under whatever names they might pass and by whatever forms their duties might be prescribed, would in effect be the mere stipendiaries and instruments of the central power.”
—Andrew Jackson (1767–1845)
“Or would interior time, that could delay
The sentence chronic with the last assize,
Start running backwards with its timely lies,
I might have time to live the love I say....”
—Allen Tate (1899–1979)
“Never tire yourself more than necessary, even if you have to found a culture on the fatigue of your bones.”
—Antonin Artaud (1896–1948)
“Women are taught that their main goal in life is to serve others—first men, and later, children. This prescription leads to enormous problems, for it is supposed to be carried out as if women did not have needs of their own, as if one could serve others without simultaneously attending to one’s own interests and desires. Carried to its “perfection,” it produces the martyr syndrome or the smothering wife and mother.”
—Jean Baker Miller (20th century)