Announcing OMF's First ME/CFS Clinical Trial!

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Myalgic Encephalomyelitis / Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME / CFS) Post Treatment Lyme Disease Syndrome (PTLDS), Fibromyalgia Leading Research. Delivering Hope.Open Medicine Foundation® Canada

Driving research of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis / Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME / CFS),
Post Treatment Lyme Disease Syndrome (PTLDS), Fibromyalgia and Long COVID.

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Special Request! Join OMFCA’s Hope Builders Community


Today we would like to introduce you to April Thompson, a valued member of OMFCA’s Hope Builders community. Hope Builders are OMFCA’s monthly donors.  April is also an artist, entrepreneur, and person living with ME/CFS. Her story inspires us, and we are honored to share it with you.

 

My name is April Thompson, and I am a proud OMF Hope Builder.

I’m also the founder of the Chronic Market, a platform for artists and artisans disabled by the condition ME/CFS. Through this platform, artists can sell their work, share their stories, create awareness about ME/CFS, and raise funds for research and advocacy.

I got sick as a peak athlete.

I developed ME/CFS 14 years ago when I was in peak physical health. I was a multi-sport athlete who ran marathons, boxed competitively and climbed mountains all over the world. I picked up a virus while I was traveling in Europe. The virus lingered, leaving me so weak I couldn’t make it around the block. Just days earlier, I’d been able to run miles on end.

 

April used to climb mountains before ME/CFS

 

The severity of my ME/CFS has fluctuated over the years, but I never fully regained my full functioning.

My birthday is now approaching. I am reaching the point where I have spent more years of my life being sick than being well.

I’ve had to change my whole life because of ME/CFS. I channeled my passions into more sedentary hobbies and interests, but you never stop mourning the loss of simple pleasures. I miss long walks and dancing with abandon.

If I were well tomorrow, the first thing I’d do is sprint down my block without fear of a crash and terrible symptoms.

 

Why did I become a Hope Builder?

OMF is a priority for my philanthropic dollars, as they are a leader in ME/CFS research. I’m proud to be a monthly donor and know that the community of artists with ME/CFS I’ve developed with the Chronic Market also feels the same.

OMF gives me hope for treatments in my lifetime. That’s why I am calling on the OMF community to join me in becoming a Hope Builder.

 

 

Your support can help bring us one step closer to finding effective treatments and a cure for ME/CFS, Long COVID and related multi-system chronic complex diseases.

Together, we can make a difference and bring hope to millions of people living with these debilitating conditions.

 

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Microvesicles and viral sequencing
Microvesicles are a type of extracellular vesicle that is released from the cell membrane. Vesicles are small, fluid-filled sacs or vacuoles within the body. Sequencing is a technique used to determine the exact sequence of bases (A, C, G, and T) in a DNA (or viral) molecule.
NMR Metabolomics
NMR (Nuclear Magnetic Resonance) is an instrument/tool used to perform metabolic studies, metabolic profiling, and metabolomics in biofluids and tissues for more than 40 years using magnetic fields. There is a very close connection between metabolic measurements and NMR. This connection has flourished because of NMR’s many unique strengths for characterizing complex mixtures’ chemical composition.
Proteomics
The large-scale study of proteins, which are large, complex molecules that are required for structure, function, and regulation of the human body's tissues and organs.
Immune cell profiling
The immune system has many important regulatory roles in disease development and progression. Given the emergence of effective immune therapies, reliable predictors of response are needed. Immune cell profiling determines response by evaluating immune cell populations from treated and untreated samples. For our purposes, we will evaluate the white blood cell response to the viral infection using a process called “Cytof.”
Leukocyte Genomics
A leukocyte is a colorless cell circulating in the blood and body fluids and is involved in counteracting foreign substances and disease. A genome is all genetic material of an organism. Genomics is a biology field focusing on the structure, function, evolution, mapping, and editing of genomes. Therefore, leukocyte genomics is the study of all genetic material of leukocytes.
Metabolomics
Metabolomics is a way to study metabolism – that is, through measuring amounts of the metabolites (small molecules) produced by our bodies as we convert food into energy and other molecules that our cells need to survive. Metabolomics technology is ‘large-scale,’ meaning that several thousand metabolites can be measured from a single sample of e.g., blood or urine.
Micro RNA
Cells use Micro RNA to control whether a particular gene is making too much, too little or the normal amount of its protein at a particular time.
Autoantibodies
Antibodies that react with self-molecules and that occur in healthy individuals and are referred to as natural antibodies or autoantibodies.
Extracellular DNA for viral reactivation and Mitochondrial DNA
exDNA (extracellular DNA), exDNA is often secreted actively and is used to perform several tasks, thereby offering an attractive target or tool for biotechnological, medical, environmental, and general microbiological applications. Viruses are intracellular parasites that rely to a significant extent on the host cell for replication. Viral reactivation occurs when an active replication of the viral genome results in a lytic (degradation of the cell) infection characterized by the release of new progeny (descendant) virus particles.