Yunus, Muhammad B · The journal of gender-specific medicine : JGSM : the official journal of the Partnership for Women's Health at Columbia · 2002
This review looked at why fibromyalgia and similar conditions like chronic fatigue syndrome affect many more women than men. Women with fibromyalgia tend to report more fatigue, worse sleep, more widespread pain, and more tender points than men. The reasons for these differences likely involve a mix of biological factors, psychological factors, and social factors.
ME/CFS shares substantial clinical and epidemiological overlap with fibromyalgia and other conditions discussed in this review. Understanding documented gender disparities in symptom expression and disease burden can help clinicians recognize ME/CFS in both men and women and may inform sex-specific research and treatment approaches.
This review does not establish the biological mechanisms causing gender differences, nor does it prove that observed differences are purely biological versus socially mediated. It also does not determine whether gender differences in symptom reporting reflect actual differences in disease pathophysiology or differences in help-seeking behavior and medical recognition.
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
Yunus, Muhammad B (2002). Gender differences in fibromyalgia and other related syndromes.. The journal of gender-specific medicine : JGSM : the official journal of the Partnership for Women's Health at Columbia. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11974674/
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-yunus-2002-gender-differences,
author = {Yunus, Muhammad B},
title = {Gender differences in fibromyalgia and other related syndromes.},
journal = {The journal of gender-specific medicine : JGSM : the official journal of the Partnership for Women's Health at Columbia},
year = {2002},
note = {PubMed: 11974674},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/yunus-2002-gender-differences},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-28. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/yunus-2002-gender-differences
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