Epidemiology
Estimating the prevalence of chronic fatigue syndrome among nurses

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Abstract

The present study assessed the prevalence of chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) in a sample of nurses. There is a paucity of studies on the prevalence of CFS in healthcare professionals. Two samples of nurses were recruited through mailed questionnaires. Data were collected on demographic characteristics and symptoms. In addition from the sample, those nurses with CFS-like symptoms were more comprehensively evaluated using a structured clinical interview and reviewing their medical records. A physician review team estimated the prevalence of CFS to be 1,088 per 100,000. These findings suggest that nurses might represent a high-risk group for this illness, possibly due to occupational stressors such as exposure to viruses in the work setting, stressful shift work that is disruptive to biologic rhythms, or to other possible stressors in the work settings (e.g., accidents).

Section snippets

Initial survey

Nurses were surveyed directly through a questionnaire that was mailed to members of 2 nurses associations. The prevalence estimates based on the first phase of this study have been published.7 Of a sample of 3,400, 202 nurses (6%) indicated that they had experienced debilitating fatigue for ≥6 months. A follow-up questionnaire was mailed to this group of 202 nurses who had experienced debilitating fatigue to assess further the presence of CFS-related symptoms and possible exclusionary

Results

A total of 37 nurses concurrently met the Fukuda et al8 criteria for CFS, and 5 additional nurses met these criteria for CFS in the past. Using a denominator of 3,400, these findings indicate a current CFS prevalence rate of 1,088 per 100,000 and a lifetime prevalence of 1,265 per 100,000. The 50 nurses who did not meet CFS case criteria were excluded due to a lack of severity of symptoms (62%), medical exclusions (30%), and psychiatric exclusions (8%).

There were no significant sociodemographic

Discussion

The present study indicates that CFS prevalence rates for nurses are higher than what has been reported by most previous epidemiologic studies.10, 11, 12 It is possible that nurses are a high-risk group due to occupational stressors, such as exposure to viruses in the work setting, stressful shift work that is disruptive to biologic rhythms, or to other possible stressors in the work settings (e.g., accidents). Shift work has been found to be related to more general fatigue, increased sickness,

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank Harriet Melrose, Lisa Schicht, Nancy Flynn, Steve Pokorny, Katherine Kohner, and Karen Danner for their valuable feedback in developing our questionnaire, and Lisa Hartman for data entry aid. Our thanks also to Judith Richman, Walter Gunn, Ken Lipman and Ruth Robin for their advice concerning diagnostic issues.

References (14)

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This work was supported by grant number 36295 from NIAID.

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