Adrenal Insufficiency and/or Fatigue
 

Was doing some reading on the chronic pain forum this morning about adrenal fatigue: http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/thread156416.html (which apparently is medically spurious but widely talked about among holistic practitioners)

This led me to read more about adrenal insufficiency: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrenal_insufficiency

Apparently the pituitary and hypothalamic forms of adrenal insufficiency can be caused by head injury, and I have read some other articles talking about how a major cause of PCS and PTSD is how the hypothalamus gets rewired in a sort of haywire way.

I definitely notice some overlap with my symptoms such as fatigue and low blood pressure. Wondering if some of the temperature regulation difficulties, etc. could also come from something like this. Think I'll ask my doctor about this in the near future.

Has anybody had adrenal hormone workups and/or supplementation or other experience with this that you could share?

I don't have a whole lot of information on this topic, but it is something I'd like to discuss with my neurologist next month.

After CNN ran their concussion special on tv a few weeks ago, I decided to read the related article on their website. I must have had some time to kill because I dove into the readers' comments section, which I know can often be a total waste of time. Well, I came across a woman commenting about how her daughter had been suffering from pcs for 2 yrs following a soccer concussion. I think her daughter had only been treated with anti-depressants and it was not helping. It wasn't until her daughter saw an endocrinologist and had her pituitary tested (with a stimulating test, I believe) that she began to recover. Apparently she had some pituitary damage and was given medication to help her lingering symptoms resolve. This woman seemed extremely happy her daughter recovered and seemed very passionate about helping other pcs sufferers too. She mentioned an endocrinologist at the University of Texas who is conducting a study on the pituitary's link to concussions. I guess it's a lot stronger than previously believed. Something like 60% of women who have had 2 concussions also have pituitary damage. (this statistic was mentioned by the woman.....I don't have a study to reference). I know you can't always believe what you read on the internet, but I know that I plan to discuss this with my doctor.

Btw, I have not had an adrenal workup yet. I do have the thermal regulation symptom you mentioned. It is so annoying. My main problem right now is the inability to sleep. I think I've had about 5 hrs of sleep in the past two days. I almost feel like a walking zombie. 6 months of insomnia takes it's toll.

Sorry for rambling. This turned into a much longer post than intended. :) Hopefully someone else here has some insight into this area.

I think I always assumed that my fatigue was a 'deliberate' evolutionary adaptation ie my injured brain forcing me to rest so that it had more chance to heal. The idea that it might be something that's specifically gone wrong is interesting, thanks

I'm pretty sure I've had Adrenal Fatigue for some time now--long before my injury. I've had Chronic Fatigue Syndrome since 2001 and have done a whole bunch of trial and error with various supplements and medications. After about 8 years with little progress, I thought about Adrenal Fatigue, bought a book on it, and tried the relevant supplements. That has made a pretty big difference in my energy level--more than any other supplement regimen I've tried.

The book is called Adrenal Fatigue: The 21st Century Stress Syndrome, by James L. Wilson. Many of the supplements he recommends are things that you may already be taking for brain health: C, Bs, E, etc., but in some cases he recommends pretty high doses. Here are the doses he recommends:

Vitamin C (with a 1:2 ratio of bioflavinoids to ascorbic acid): 2,000-4,000 mg/day, spread out over at least two doses.
Vitamin E (in mixed tocopheral form): 800 I.U./day
Pantothenic Acid: 1500 mg/day
Niacin: 25-50 mg/day
B6: 50-100 mg/day
B3: 75-125 mg/day
B12: 200-400 mcg/day
Magnesium (as Magnesium Citrate): 400 mg/day
Calcium (citrate or lactate): 750-1000 mg/day
(He says not to take Cal and Mag together. I've heard conflicting views on this.)
Trace Minerals, including zinc, manganese, selenium, molybdenum, chromium, copper, and iodine.
Fiber

As you can see, some of these doses are really high, but my understanding is that they're all safe. All the same, it probably wouldn't hurt to double-check. I know that Niacin in high doses can produce a harmless but unpleasant "Niacin flush," but the dose he recommends above is well below flush levels.

Some of the herbal supplements he recommends are Licorice Root, Ginseng (either Siberian or Panax), and Ginkgo Biloba. I noticed a big difference in energy level with these. There are some cautions with Licorice Root--most notably, it elevates blood pressure--but since you have low blood pressure this may not be as much of an issue. I also have low blood pressure, so it hasn't caused me any problems. It wouldn't hurt to double-check possible side effects of all these herbs before trying them. I tend to get sleep difficulties with anything higher than a minimal dose of Ginkgo.

There is also replacement hormone therapy, via cortisol or adrenal cell extracts, but one has to be really careful with this. It might be a good idea to get your cortisol levels tested.

Finally, Dr. Jacob Teitelbaum has a very helpful site on Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, which might have some helpful info. on adrenal insufficiency and hypothalamic/pituitary dysfunction:

http://www.endfatigue.com/

Pete

Do you have a link to this CNN article?

Just to clarify, adrenal insufficiency IS a recognized medical diagnosis. And it appears that there is a recognized link to head injury. So that is something you could ask your doctor about without being totally ridiculed. :)

I just sent an email to my neurologist asking about this.

bh_pcs - I'm attempting to link the article here. Hopefully it works. I'm not good at this stuff. Just to clarify, the CNN article does not talk about pituitary dysfunction, a reader does in the comments section. The woman who made the comments is "Dorothy" and she's from Texas.

http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2012/0...ge-1/#comments

Here's a peer-reviewed article on a related topic: http://www.endfatigue.com/web-newsle...ma_cfs_fm.html

So, the more I look into this, it seems like there is a lot of overlap between PCS, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, and other adrenal malfunctions: insomnia, restless leg, brain fog, fatigue, headaches. I'm also having a lot of the muscle pain and possibly trigger point symptoms which came on after my head injury, and it looks like there's a decent amount of research showing that adrenal, pituitary, hypothalamic malfunction and even fibromyalgia can be triggered by head injury.

Has anybody heard of or looked into these connections before? Anybody diagnosed with these other things or received treatments specified for them?