Fibromyalgia Information


Six million or more suffer from fibromyalgia in the United States alone. When their doctors tell them about the diagnosis, their first question is usually the same. What is fibromyalgia? This question often remains unanswered. They return to tell their family what the doctor has told them, and their family members ask the same question. What is fibromyalgia? They cannot answer this question because there is no research that has provided a definitive answer. Often people like to do some independent research, and they might go to the local library. The librarian will help them once they tell them about their search. The librarian will probably ask the same question. What is fibromyalgia?


The constant fatigue syndrome is also called as the fibromyalgia or the FMS disorder which is not a very serious and life threatening disease. The disorder affects the muscles and bones and joints of the individual causing pain and fatigue all over his/her body. The patient with the FMS condition is not at all fresh; he feels stressed out and exhausted even after his/her sleep. The disorder affects in a very peculiar way, the patient has on the particular parts of his body such tender and sensitive places that experience pain as soon as they are pressurized slightly. The diagnostic criteria for this disease has been devised by the American College of Rheumatology and which has laid down certain points for the diagnosis of the disease which are known as the ACR1990. The disease doesn’t have any cure and is also not at all life threatening. There are many risk factors for this disease from which one can see for himself if he/she is prone to FMS.


The term fibromyalgia has been derived from the Latin and Greek words; in which fibra is a Latin word which means fiber and the Greek words myo and algos stands for pain and muscle respectively. This disorder has been the object of study since the 1800s and earlier it was also called as muscular rheumatism and fibrositis.

The condition known as fibromyalgia places a significant role in the life of a woman afflicted with it. The affects of the condition can be serious and can impact her reproductive health including her ability to become pregnant and also follow and affect her through the years including producing PMS symptoms and affect her during menopause. There are many affects fibromyalgia can have on her health that she should be aware of and prepare for in order to improve her quality of life.

Did you know that 85 to 90% of all patients with fibromyalgia are women? Researchers and scientists are not sure why there is such an imbalance regarding sexual statistics for the condition.

FMS or fibromyalgia disease has a very strange and confusing etiology and the cause and diagnosis of the disease has not been ascertained yet. The disorder cripples the individual’s muscles making them weak stiff. The FMS disease comes in different symptoms and makes the diagnosis more difficult. The pain in the muscles and tissues, the tender points on specific regions of the body coupled with constant fatigue are the main symptoms of the disease. The American College of Rheumatology has defined certain diagnostic criteria for the disease. The FMS disease is not contagious and does nothing in terms of the patient’s life expectancy unless there are no other complications of other diseases. it is believed that as many as 80% of fibromyalgia patients are women thus disease mainly affects women but it also affects men which then becomes a different thing.

When you are diagnosed with fibromyalgia, the first thing you want to know is what it is and how you can get rid of it. Unfortunately, there is no cure for fibromyalgia and experts still don’t really know what causes it. They just know the symptoms, which are characterized by fatigue, muscle and bone aches, as well as a number of others. However, this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to fibromyalgia information. Your best bet is to ask your doctor as many questions about the disease that you can so that you can better understand the disorder you’ve been diagnosed with.

Are you curious about the real facts, figures and myths behind the medical condition, fibromyalgia? You can discover through the American College of Rheumatology some very interesting facts and figures about fibromyalgia and using any search engine you can find some very fascinating myths circulating online about fibromyalgia as well. In this article you can discover the facts, figures and myths debunked all in one convenient place.

Facts and Figures:

In America there are currently over 6 million individuals suffering from fibromyalgia of all ages. Basically, one in every 50 Americans you meet on the streets is suffering from fibromyalgia. Out of those suffering in America, 80% to 90% of them are women. This is why some refer to this as a “woman’s disease”.

Despite the fact that like 80% of all fibromyalgia patients are women, there are some males with the condition who also need to be able to deal with the condition on their terms. Males often approach illness in a totally different way then women do. There is also a female stigma associated with the condition, fibromyalgia that could make it even more difficult for a man to receive a correct diagnosis based on his symptoms and medical history. His doctor would have to be current on fibromyalgia research and open to the possibilities of all diagnosis’s that could be the root of his symptoms including fibromyalgia. Sometimes if we are not looking for something, we don’t see it.

Patients dealing with the diagnosis of fibromyalgia require information so that they can deal with their condition on a daily basis. The information they need concerns what the symptoms are and what to expect about the treatment.

Fibromyalgia is a condition in which there are dysfunction in the autonomic nervous system and also dysfunction in the immune system. These systems are responsible for the symptoms associated with the condition. If the person is young the main symptom they will experience is usually pain, if the person is more than 60 years of age the main symptom they usually feel is fatigue. Other symptoms are sleeping disturbance, dizziness, nausea, morning stiffness, and some experience irritable bowel syndrome.

The fibromyalgia disease is the disorder of the muscles, nervous system, and insomnia. The disease affects the joints, bones, and the sleeping pattern of the patient. There is pain in the different parts of the body and at some areas in the body the pain is severe which is so sensitive that it can not tolerate a simple tap, thus the body develops such tender points because of the fibromyalgia condition. The causes, treatment, and to some extent the diagnosis are not very well documented. But one thing is definite about this disorder that it cannot develop further after its onset and it never kills the patient. Scientists and researchers have only been able to identify the possible and most common reasons that may lead to FMS. In the United States alone there are 3. 7miliion patients of this disorder. The cure for this disease is also not yet in sight but the conventional treatment helps in the reduction of pain and it also improves the sleep. There are theories that have been proposed for the causes of FMS and some of them lay stress on the dysfunction of the nervous system while others think that it may be related to the microtrauma injury of the muscle.

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