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Original Article

Vegetative-Vascular Dystonia and Osteoalgetic Syndrome or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome as a Characteristic After-Effect of Radioecological Disaster

The Chernobyl Accident Experience

Pages 3-16 | Published online: 04 Dec 2011
 

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study was to determine whether the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) definition could be applicable to the assessment of the medical aftermath of radioecological disasters and to investigate a possible psychophysiological basis of fatigue in Chernobyl accident survivors. One hundred randomly selected clean-up workers of the Chernobyl accident who presented with complains of fatigue were examined neuropsychiatrically using MMPI profiles, Quantitative Electroencephalography (QEEG) and Somatosensory evoked potentials (SSEP). Twenty-six percent of them met the CFS diagnostic criteria. Their absorbed radiation doses were less than 0.3 Sv, an exposure level that is not expected to produce a clear deterministic radiation effect. Clinical symptomatology included persistent fatigue, odd skin sensations, bizarre feelings in bones, muscles and joints, irritability, headache, vertigo, pain in the chest area, emotional lability, irritability, lack of concentration and memory, cognitive deterioration, depression signs and sleep disorders. Liquidators with CFS had the characteristic MMPI profile with increased hypochondria, depression, clear hypochondria, schizophrenia, hysteria, psychasthenia, and bizarre sensory perception scales. Spectral analysis of QEEG showed lateralised (left-sided) increase of θ-power (P < 0.001) and lateralised (left-sided) decrease of a-power (P < 0.001) and lateralised (left-sided) increase of β-power (P < 0.01). SSEP were characterized by increased latencies and decreased amplitudes. SSEP significantly differed by topographic abnormalities in the left temporoparietal area in liquidators with CFS. Associations between schizophrenia-like, hypochondriac and psychasthenic psycho-pathology and an increase of latency of SSEP P300 and N400 in liquidators with CFS were revealed. Thus, “Vegetative-Vascular Dystonia” and “Osteoalgetic Syndrome” cases following exposure to ionizing radiation as a result of the Chernobyl accident can be classified as CFS cases. The psychophysiological basis of fatigue in liquidators consists of dysfunction of the cortico-limbical structures of the left, dominating, hemisphere. CFS is one of the most important consequences of radio-ecological disaster, which results from an interaction of different hazardous environmental factors.

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