Staud, Roland, Boissoneault, Jeff, Craggs, Jason G et al. · Fatigue : biomedicine, health & behavior · 2018 · DOI
Researchers used advanced brain imaging to track blood flow while patients with ME/CFS and healthy people performed a challenging mental task. They found that while the overall amount of blood flowing to the brain was similar in both groups, specific brain regions showed different patterns when people were recovering from fatigue. In ME/CFS patients, fatigue improved when blood flow decreased in certain memory and attention areas, whereas in healthy people, fatigue improved when blood flow increased in those same areas.
This study provides mechanistic evidence that ME/CFS involves fundamentally different brain physiology during cognitive recovery, not simply reduced overall brain blood flow. Understanding these region-specific differences may help explain why mental exertion causes persistent worsening in ME/CFS and could guide future therapeutic targets.
This study does not prove that abnormal blood flow causes ME/CFS fatigue—only that the association differs from healthy controls. The small sample size and exclusive focus on women limits whether findings apply to all ME/CFS patients. Correlation between rCBF changes and fatigue improvement does not establish a direct causal mechanism.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
The first block is for the primary paper and is the citation you should use in research work. The atlas-snapshot line only applies if you are specifically referring to this atlas’s reading of the paper on the date shown.
Primary citation
Staud, Roland, Boissoneault, Jeff, Craggs, Jason G, Lai, Song, & Robinson, Michael E (2018). Task Related Cerebral Blood Flow Changes of Patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: An Arterial Spin Labeling Study.. Fatigue : biomedicine, health & behavior. https://doi.org/10.1080/21641846.2018.1453919
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-staud-2018-task-related,
author = {Staud, Roland and Boissoneault, Jeff and Craggs, Jason G and Lai, Song and Robinson, Michael E},
title = {Task Related Cerebral Blood Flow Changes of Patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: An Arterial Spin Labeling Study.},
journal = {Fatigue : biomedicine, health & behavior},
year = {2018},
doi = {10.1080/21641846.2018.1453919},
note = {PubMed: 29707427},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/staud-2018-task-related},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-30. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/staud-2018-task-related
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