Monday, October 08, 2007

Dark chocolate? I'll try that!

Researchers at Hull and York Medical School have conducted a small pilot study which has suggested that moderate consumption of dark chocolate may help alleviate some symptoms of ME/CFS. See here for the BBC report on the study. A number of groups have bee quite critical of the study, with Heather Walker, of Action for ME, making the following scathing comment:
"Wouldn’t it be wonderful if eating chocolate every day could alleviate the symptoms of chronic illness? If it were that easy, there would not be 250,000 people in the UK today whose lives are being been devastated by ME.”
While, I understand her point, and I certainly would like to see more serious research into ME/CFS, I can't help but disagree with the implication that research effort shouldn't be wasted on seemingly simple things with may alleviate symptoms but not lead to an overall cure.
I mean look at cancer, look at AIDS - an awful lot of research effort has been going into finding a cure for those (terminal) conditions for decades now with no real result. Even if significant worldwide funding for CFS research is achieved, it may still be many decades before an underlying cause or, hallelujah, a cure is found. In the meantime I fully support any research into symptom alleviation strategies. And really, this is one hell of a simple strategy!
Charles Shepherd of the ME Association has presented a more balanced view of the research, pointing out the obvious deficiencies of the study (predominantly the small sample size), offering some possible explanations for the positive results observed in the study, and advising ME/CFS sufferers that there is no inherent danger in them trying this for themselves, with the obvious caveat to be aware of the effects of chocolate on your existing medical issues (eg migraines).
Personally I think I'll give the chocolate a go. No, I'm not expecting a miracle cure, but any little things that helps is worth it, and this is something I can try for myself without medical supervision.

Labels: CFS, chocolate, chronic fatigue syndrome, research, symptoms

4 comments

Posted by Ellie at 3:18 PM

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Seeing the beauty in the mundane

Do you do something arty or crafty, or musical, or creative in some other way? Something that lets you express your feeling, hopes, and despairs in a non-verbal way? Does it help you cope with your illness?

Tell you what - I do. Actually I do all sorts of things depending on how the mood takes me and what my latest obsession is - beading, felting, painting... They all come and go, and I'm not terribly good at any of them, but the one constant, and the most therapeutic for me, is photography. I love taking photos. I have a camera the size of a pack of cards which I carry everywhere. I mean that pretty literally too - it lives in my handbag so I nearly always have it on hand. I also have a hulking old SLR. A trusty model created in the late 60s (yes, it's over a decade older than me!) that will probably be still going strong when the latest lot of digitals have all given up the ghost. I just bought 2 new lenses for it, which I am very excited about trying out!

Anyway, enough raving about my gorgeous photographic equipment, the point of all this is why I love photography so much. Because... (drum roll please)... It makes me see the beauty in the world around me. Sometimes, when my illness is getting me down, it can be hard to enjoy the world around me. But when you have a photographers eyes, you're always subconciously looking
for the beauty in things - be it the composition of a certain arrangement of buildings, or the colouring in a garden bed you walk past. And surprisingly there is always beauty to be seen in the most mundane seeming scenes. I love being able to see that.