ELI5; How do central nervous system disorders work? For example, why does fibromyalgia make it impossible for an otherwise healthy 29yr old unable to open a bag of chips?
In: Biology
Speaking broadly, central nervous system (CNS) disorders happen when your brain or spinal cord do things they aren’t supposed to do, whether that’s sending out too many signals or not enough signals. Here, you should be thinking things like stroke, Alzheimer dementia, Parkinson, epilepsy, and multiple sclerosis. With these, there is actual structural/chemical problem in the nerves leading to the symptoms. We can see those changes with imaging, lab work, and nerve function studies.
Something like fibromyalgia is not really a CNS disorder in that sense. We don’t really know why fibromyalgia happens, but what we do know is that there is no real identifiable underlying nerve problem seen. The most common presenting symptom of fibromyalgia is long-standing, widespread pain.
To further drop some knowledge bombs on fibromyalgia:
– it’s sometimes associated with other chronic pain conditions like IBS and chronic pelvic pain (interstitial cystitis)
– stress is usually a trigger, which it’s why it’s often associated with depression and anxiety
– there’s not really a good treatment because we don’t really know what’s going on.
Source: final year medical student
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