In a pilot study, 14 Gulf War veterans were randomly selected from a large list of those with unexplained illness, to compare the functional integrity of the peripheral and central nervous systems with a group of 13 healthy civillian control subjects using predetermined outcome measures. The controls were matched closely for age and sex, handedness and physical activity. Outcome measures included scoring of symptoms and clinical neurological signs, quantative sensory testing of heat, cold and vibration sensibilities, motor and sensory nerve conduction studies on upper and lower limbs, needle EMG of distal and proximal muscles and multimodality evoked potential (visual, brainstem, and somatosensory) studies.
Three measurements, all related to peripheral nerve function (cold threshold (P = 0.0002), sural nerve latency (P = 0.034) were abnormal in the veterans compared with the controls. There may be a dysfunction in veterans but more studies are required to investigate the findings further and to characterise the dysfunction if confirmed.
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