How Can We Help Patients Fight Fatigue with Comprehensive Laboratory Testing?
Fatigue is a hallmark of everything from minor ailments to chronic conditions. Whether it’s autoimmune disorders, cancer, or depression, fatigue is often among the first clinical presentations for debilitating diseases. At the same time, fatigue symptomizes minor complaints, including deficient and excessive exercise levels.
Although fatigue is one of the most common non-specific symptoms, it shouldn’t be ignored. As well as signaling the onset of other damaging health conditions, chronic fatigue considerably affects your patients’ daily routines and overall quality of life. However, with such broad clinical applications, isolating the causes of fatigue and developing effective treatment plans presents a challenge. For the best patient care, it’s important to develop a comprehensive understanding of the sources of fatigue, effective methods for isolating its cause, and comprehensive treatments.
Causes of Fatigue
Fatigue has been connected to several significant sources, from dietary and lifestyle factors to medications and underlying diseases.
Lifestyle
Many with fatigue are likely suffering the consequences of one or more lifestyle choices. Smoking, excessive exercise, stress, drinking alcohol, and excessive caffeine can all contribute to fatigue, as well as:
Nutritional Deficiencies
Poor nutrition can significantly impact your patients’ energy levels. An unhealthy diet, packed with junk foods and complex carbohydrates, can lead to severe nutritional deficiencies. Without healthy variety in the diet, your patient will likely lack in iron, magnesium, zins, coenzyme Q10, and other nutrients that stimulate the production of mitochondrial energy. Lower intake of these vital nutrients result in reduced levels of adenosine triphosphate, without which there is little energy reserved for essential cell processes.
In particular, each of the B-complex vitamins, except folate, are involved in at least one step of the cellular energy production system. A lack of B-complex vitamins stunts energy production at a cellular level, contributing to long-term exhaustion. As these B-complex vitamins are often sourced from healthy proteins and leafy greens, your patients’ fatigue could be caused by a poorly balanced diet.
Dehydration
For many of your patients, dehydration is likely responsible for their midday fatigue. Proper fluid levels aid in blood flow to vital organs, including the brain. Insufficient water consumption leads to feelings of fatigue as vital organs struggle to function without proper blood flow.
Medicines
Fatigue is a potential side effect for many medications. By reducing heart rate, beta-blockers and similar blood pressure medications can cause fatigue, drowsiness, and lethargy. Antihistamines, antidepressants, and other medications could also be contributing to your patient’s sense of exhaustion. Be sure to monitor their medications and ensure that they’re taking the proper dosage.
Sleep Disorders and Lack of Sleep
One of the first factors to examine when treating fatigue is your patients’ sleep schedules. Stress and busy schedules can cause short-term sleeping troubles, but be sure to check for more severe disorders like insomnia or sleep apnea.
Diseases and Chronic Conditions
Even if your patients’ fatigue seems to be related to certain lifestyle choices, remember that insidious diseases may be contributing to long-term exhaustion. Your patients’ total load may be affected more significantly by minor aspects of their lifestyle due to underlying conditions. When treating fatigue, consider testing for:
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Mental health disorders. Chronic anxiety and depression, which are among the most common mental health disorders, are commonly symptomized by low energy and chronic fatigue.
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Heart disease. Undiagnosed cardiovascular disease can present as fatigue. Lack of cardiac output reduces blood flow to vital organs, including the brain, affecting energy and mental clarity.
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Thyroid disease. Due to the key role that thyroid hormones play in your patients’ overall well-being, thyroid diseases have a remarkable effect on energy levels. Imbalances of the two main thyroid hormones, thyroxine (T4) and triiodothyronine (T3), affect metabolic rate and energy conversion. Both hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism are linked with chronic fatigue. Likewise, similar hormonal imbalances, in particular with cortisol, can contribute to fatigue.
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Cancer and autoimmune diseases. Cancer contributes to fatigue in two ways. First, the primary disease process puts undue strain on cell repair and general body functions, draining energy reserves. Second, the various treatments, including chemotherapy and radiotherapy, affect the healthy function of cells and damage the immune system. Likewise, autoimmune diseases, possibly through their influence on inflammation levels and the central nervous system, are commonly associated with extreme levels of chronic fatigue.
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Diabetes. Likewise, diabetes doubly contributes to fatigue. Blood glucose metabolism and fluctuations in blood glucose levels are common in patients with diabetes, which drastically affect energy production. Additionally, the complications associated with diabetes, such as hyperglycemia, cardiovascular disease, or neuropathy, are, themselves, symptomized by increased fatigue.
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Allergies. Inflammatory histamine reactions caused by allergies and food sensitivities may be having long-term effects on your patients’ energy. If your patients’ are experiencing otherwise unexplained fatigue, consider more extensive testing for unknown sensitivities.
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Toxic metal exposure. Exposure to toxic metals, both through the diet and the environment, can cause fatigue. One study found that one patient’s chronic fatigue symptoms improved significantly after he was treated for mercury exposure.
Comprehensive Clinical Approaches
There’s no single cure-all for fatigue. However, healthy supplementation is an excellent, holistic way to combat the effects of fatigue. Encourage your patients to include iodine, selenium, zinc, T3, T4 in their daily supplements. Additionally, your patients may benefit by removing or limiting unhealthy foods and processed sugars in their diet, and including curcumin and other natural anti-inflammatories. Consider adding electrolyte supplements and increasing water consumption.
However, for the most effective treatment, it’s best to target the specific sources of fatigue. With dozens of possible sources, leading experts are turning to comprehensive panels that test for several markers at once.
Effective Testing for Fatigue
Paired with a general physical and psychological evaluation, blood, saliva, and urine panels test for a broad swathe of potential causes, report with recordable accuracy, and return results quickly. With heart health, hormone, cancer, allergy and sensitivity, heavy metal, and many more panels, Access Medical Labs provides expert testing services. We maintain an industry-leading turnaround time. With Access, you can quickly process the data you need to treat your patients. Explore more from Access Medical Labs.
