Abstract:
BACKGROUND: Activity logs involve patients writing down their activities and symptoms over 1 or more days. Aims This study sought to classify daily fatigue patterns among patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) using activity logs.
METHOD: Fatigue intensity was self-reported every 30 min in a sample of 90 patients with CFS over 1 day. A cluster analysis using fatigue intensity, variability and slope was conducted.
RESULTS: Three clusters emerged involving patients with different trajectories. One group evidenced high fatigue intensity, low variability, and fatigue intensity stayed the same over time. A second group had moderate fatigue intensity, high variability, and fatigue intensity decreased over time. A third group had moderate fatigue intensity, high variability, but fatigue intensity increased over time. The three clusters of patients differed on measures of actigraphy, pain and immune functioning.
CONCLUSIONS: Activity logs can provide investigators and clinicians with valuable sources of data for understanding patterns of fatigue and activity among patients with CFS.
Source: Jason LA, Brown MM. Sub-typing daily fatigue progression in chronic fatigue syndrome. J Ment Health. 2013 Feb;22(1):4-11. doi: 10.3109/09638237.2012.670879. Epub 2012 May 1. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3889482/ (Full article)