Trauma

Over half the number of fibromyalgia patients attribute their symptoms to some type of trauma.  Dr. Mark Pellegrino, an Ohio physiatrist and author of "Inside Fibromyalgia" states that 65% of 2,000 patients seen between 1990 and 1995  reported the onset of their symptoms after a traumatic event.   The most common trauma reported was an automobile accident followed by trauma as a result of a work injury.  Dr. Pellegrino suggests that the mechanism by which trauma leads to fibromyalgia appears to be peripheral triggers from the trauma that mediate biochemical and neurologic changes, first in the muscle and then in the central nervuous system (spinal cord and brain).  Once the trauma sets the process in motion, eventually it leads to fully developed fibromyalgia syndrome.  At first the fibromyalgia may be regional - at the site where the injury occurred.  Then over time it becomes generalized and may cause pain in areas that were never injured.  To date, even though there still is no absolute scientific explanation for this phenomenon, most treating physicians agree that physical trauma can be the instigator to the development of fibromyalgia.