Many people believe these may be the same illness, as discussed in the prev=
ious
question above. However, CFS researcher Dr. Paul Cheney notes that CFS pati=
ents
have a strong intolerance for exercise, while for fibromyalgia patients, ex=
ercise is
recommended as being therapeutic. An article by Dr. Muhammed Yunus discusse=
s a
comparison between these two conditions -- see Appendix 1.

There is a patients discussion group for fibromyalgia on Internet and Usene=
t, and there
are web pages and information files available. To find fibromyalgia informa=
tion on the
web, you can begin by exploring the links at http://www.cfs-news.org/fibro.=
htm. The
discussion group is available on Usenet as newsgroup alt.med.fibromyalgia. =
It can be
followed as a mailing list by sending the command SUB FIBROM-L YourFirstNam=
e
YourLastName as an e-mail message to the address
LISTSERV@MITVMA.MIT.EDU. There are fibromyalgia FAQs for patients, for
doctors, and a help file about pain, all available by e-mail. To obtain the=
m, create an
e-mail message which says

GET FIBROM-L PT-FAQ
GET FIBROM-L MD-FAQ
GET FM-PAIN HANDOUT

and send to address LISTSERV@MITVMA.MIT.EDU.