Tai, Foong Way David, Palsson, Olafur S, Lam, Ching Y et al. · Neurogastroenterology and motility · 2020 · DOI
This study looked at people with joint hypermobility disorders (including Ehlers-Danlos syndrome) to understand how often they experience stomach and digestive problems. The researchers found that those who also have POTS (a condition affecting heart rate and blood pressure when standing) had significantly more digestive issues than those without POTS. The digestive problems remained worse in the POTS group even after accounting for other conditions like chronic fatigue syndrome.
Many ME/CFS patients have comorbid connective tissue disorders and POTS, conditions that frequently cluster together. Understanding how POTS amplifies gastrointestinal symptom burden in hypermobility disorders may illuminate shared pathophysiological mechanisms relevant to ME/CFS populations and guide more targeted symptom management strategies.
This study demonstrates association but cannot establish causation—POTS may worsen GI symptoms, or both may share a common underlying pathology. Self-reported POTS diagnosis (not objectively measured via tilt testing) introduces potential misclassification bias. The findings are specific to HSD/hEDS populations and may not generalize to ME/CFS patients without hypermobility disorders.
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
Tai, Foong Way David, Palsson, Olafur S, Lam, Ching Y, Whitehead, William E, Sperber, Ami D, Tornblom, Hans, et al. (2020). Functional gastrointestinal disorders are increased in joint hypermobility-related disorders with concomitant postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome.. Neurogastroenterology and motility. https://doi.org/10.1111/nmo.13975
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-tai-2020-functional-gastrointestinal,
author = {Tai, Foong Way David and Palsson, Olafur S and Lam, Ching Y and Whitehead, William E and Sperber, Ami D and Tornblom, Hans and Simren, Magnus and Aziz, Imran},
title = {Functional gastrointestinal disorders are increased in joint hypermobility-related disorders with concomitant postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome.},
journal = {Neurogastroenterology and motility},
year = {2020},
doi = {10.1111/nmo.13975},
note = {PubMed: 32803794},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/tai-2020-functional-gastrointestinal},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-27. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/tai-2020-functional-gastrointestinal
Contribute
Private, reviewed by a human. Not a public comment thread.