For many people, FM and CFS/ME remain a mystery. It's only through the efforts of doctors and researchers that we've been able to reveal what we know thus far about these debilitating illnesses. This section spotlights some of the top people who are involved in FM and/or CFS/ME research. Select the doctor you'd like to learn more about by clicking their name in the list below.

Graduate of Tufts University School of Medicine. He has been on the teaching staff at the Los Angeles Harbor/UCLA Hospital, Department of Endocrinology for over 43 years. He is currently an assistant clinical professor at the UCLA School of Medicine.

Dr. St. Amand is a professor of endocrinology and has been in private practice for over 40 years. Dr. St. Amand discovered guaifenesin's use as a treatment for fibromyalgia, and his work is cited wherever the substance is mentioned.

Doctorate in Rheumatology, 1990, from Georgetown University Medical Center. Professor, Department of Internal Medicine at the University of Michigan. He has served on the faculty at Michigan University since April 8, 2003.

Dr. Daniel J. Clauw oversees a multidisciplinary group that performs both mechanistic studies and clinical trials in overlapping conditions characterized by chronic pain and fatigue, including fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, and Gulf War Illnesses. Dr. Clauw has been the P. I. of NIH and Department of Defense grants studying this spectrum of illness continuously since 1994. The Center currently has several million dollars per year in federal funding to study these disorders. Dr. Clauw and his group have been instrumental in establishing that the systemic conditions noted above, and regional pain syndromes such as interstitial cystitis, low back pain, and irritable bowel syndrome all have common pathogenic and clinical features.

One of the primary areas of interest of his group has been in studying sensory processing in these conditions, and in demonstrating that many patients with these conditions have a widespread disturbance in pain processing. Current work is establishing the nature of the central pain processing abnormality in these conditions, using a variety of approaches, including functional MRI. Dr. Clauw also directs the Center for the Advancement of Clinical Research (CACR) at the University of Michigan. The CACR provides infrastructure and support for clinical and translational research for the Medical School from protocol development through subject recruitment, performance, and monitoring of study conduct, to data management and analysis.

Dr. Garry F. Gordon received his Doctor of Osteopathy in 1958 from the Chicago College of Osteopathy in Illinois. He received his honorary MD degree from the University of California Irvine in 1962 and completed his Radiology Residency from Mt. Zion in San Francisco, California in 1964. For many years, he was the Medical Director of Mineral Lab in Hayward, California, a leading laboratory for trace mineral analysis worldwide.

Dr. Gordon is on the Board of Homeopathic Medical Examiners for Arizona and is Co-Founder of the American College for Advancement in Medicine (ACAM). He is Founder/President of the International College of Advanced Longevity (ICALM) and Board Member of International Oxidative Medicine Association (IOMA).

B. A. in Psychology from Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts, 1971. Ph.D. in Clinical/Community Psychology from the University of Rochester, Rochester, New York, 1975. Dr. Jason is Director of the Center for Community Research at De Paul University.

In 2001, the Center for Community Research was established at De Paul University to provide permanent, dedicated space for externally funded research projects and to house research projects of colleagues associated with their work from Psychology and related disciplines.

Currently their grants are from NIH (NIDA, NIAID, NCI) and are devoted to CFS epidemiology, Smoking Prevention, and Oxford House evaluations. They believe that this is a service to De Paul University and the Psychology Department, as their grant activity brings in considerable resources to the university and helps support graduate students. In addition, there are many undergraduate volunteers for these projects, and frequently they are able to hire these students to become full time research assistants, which prepares them for future graduate studies.

B. A. and M.A. in Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, N. Y. Earned his M.D. degree from Albany Medical College, NY, in 1974. Dr. Lapp completed residencies in both adult (internal) medicine and pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Dr. Lapp has maintained a private practice of medicine and pediatrics in Raleigh, NC. since 1978. Following three small epidemics of a chronic fatiguing illness in the Raleigh area, Dr. Lapp began collaborating with Dr. Paul Cheney in 1987, and from 1992 to 1995. Dr. Lapp acted as Medical Director of the Cheney Clinic in Charlotte. In August 1995, Dr. Lapp opened a Charlotte office for general medical consultations, with special interests in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Fibromyalgia, and related conditions.

Academically, Dr. Lapp has been elected to Tau Beta Pi (the engineering equivalent of Phi Beta Kappa) and was a Richard T. Beebe Scholar of Medicine; he has been on the clinical faculty at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, was a pediatrics instructor at Wake Medical Center (Raleigh), and has continued as Clinical Associate Professor of Family and Community Medicine at Duke University since 1982. He is a diplomat of the American Board of Internal Medicine as well as the American Board of Pediatrics; he is a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians, and the American Academy of Disability Evaluating Physicians.

In September 2003, Dr. Lapp was appointed by DHHS Secretary Tommy Thompson to serve on the CFS Advisory Committee. This committee meets in Washington quarterly to provide expert advice and recommendations to the Secretary of Health and Human Services on a broad range of issues and topics pertaining to chronic fatigue syndrome.

Dr. Lapp is nationally recognized as a medical consultant to industry and the medical profession. He has written numerous articles on diverse subjects, and has spoken widely, especially concerning Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Fibromyalgia. He is active in both civic and professional activities, the state and county medical societies, as well as the American Medical Association and the Academy of Family Physicians. He is an active Rotarian, former president of the Muscular Dystrophy Association, and as a Jaycee was nominated Outstanding Man of the Year in 1983. In 1985, the Department of Family and Community Medicine at Duke University voted him Clinical Professor of the Year. Dr. Lapp is a board member of the American Association for CFS and the American Fibromyalgia Syndrome Association, advisor to ProHealth Incorporated, medical advisor to the CFIDS Association of America and a member of the Scientific Advisory Council.

Dr. Lowe holds B. A. and M.A. degrees in research-oriented general psychology from the University of West Florida. He also holds a B. S. degree in human biology and a doctorate in chiropractic from the Los Angeles College of Chiropractic, now the Southern California University of Health Sciences. He formerly taught psychology at the Miami Dade Community College and was a faculty member in the Clinical Sciences Division of the Texas Chiropractic College. Dr. John C. Lowe, a fibromyalgia, thyroid, and metabolism researcher, is a board certified pain management specialist.

As Director of Research for the Fibromyalgia Research Foundation, he has spearheaded the scientific study of two related subjects: the metabolic causes of fibromyalgia, and the relief of fibromyalgia symptoms through the treatment approach he developed and named "metabolic rehabilitation." He is author of the internationally acclaimed book, The Metabolic Treatment of Fibromyalgia, considered by many to be the most important document ever published on fibromyalgia. He has authored more than 140 articles, scientific papers, and book chapters. His writings have appeared in many of the top medical journals.

In 1995, one of Dr. Lowe's patients who had recovered from their fibromyalgia symptoms through his metabolic approach convinced him to established the Fibromyalgia Research Foundation (FRF). The three purposes of this 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization are to: (1) support scientific studies of the metabolic treatment of fibromyalgia patients; (2) determine the underlying molecular mechanisms of fibromyalgia; and (3) educate fibromyalgia patients, health care practitioners, researchers, and the general public about the findings of FRF-sponsored research.

Currently, Dr. Lowe and his multidisciplinary research team are studying the metabolic rates of fibromyalgia patients. In two studies that will soon be published, he and his colleagues found that fibromyalgia patients have abnormally low metabolic rates compared to healthy controls. Results of these studies vindicate Dr. Lowe's hypothesis that fibromyalgia patients are hypometabolic, and that the most likely mechanism is too little thyroid hormone regulation.

A graduate of Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Public Health, Dr. Podell is Board Certified in Internal Medicine and in Family Medicine. A Clinical Professor at New Jersey's Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Dr. Podell serves as co-host of the Willner's Window Health and Nutrition Show on New York City's WOR Radio (710 AM). Richard N. Podell, M.D., M.P.H., Medical Director and Clinical Professor, Department of Family Medicine, UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.

Dr. Podell is one of the nation's leading experts on the scientific integration of complementary and alternative therapies with conventional medicine. He also has special interest and expertise in clinical nutrition, behavioral medicine, and the diseases of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Fibromyalgia.

The New Jersey Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Association presented Dr. Podell with their outstanding Achievement Award for the year 2002. Dr. Podell serves as Principal Investigator of a Food and Drug Administration approved Phase III clinical trial on the use of Ampligen, an investigational drug for the treatment of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. He is a member of the expert panel on Chronic Fatigue Syndrome for the New Jersey State Department of Health and the New Jersey Academy of Medicine. He is a member of the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Association, the International Myopain Society, the American College of Nutrition and the American Medical Association.

Dr. Podell has been an invited author for Fibromyalgia Network, a major patient-advocacy support group. Dr. Podell has served as one of the main preceptors for Robert Wood Johnson Medical School's required third year course on nutritional and holistic medicine. Dr. Podell has received teaching awards from the family practice residents at Overlook Hospital and from the medical student organization at New Jersey Medical School.

Dr. Podell is on the scientific advisory board of Healthnotes, one of the leading educational resources for the scientific evaluation of nutrition and herbal therapies. He was contributing editor for Nutrition Science News, and was the regular columnist on nutrition for the journal Postgraduate Medicine. Dr. Podell has published 45 peer-review journal articles, and patient education essays in Bottom Line Personal, Bottom Line Health, Redbook, Good Housekeeping, Men's Health and other magazines. He has appeared as a medical expert on Good Morning America, the Today Show and CBS' Morning Show. Dr. Podell is an attending physician at Overlook Hospital, Summit, NJ.

Dr. Teitelbaum is a board certified internist and Medical Director of the national Fibromyalgia and Fatigue Centers, Inc. He is the author of the perennial best-seller From Fatigued to Fantastic!, which has sold over 500,000 copies. The 3rd revised edition from Avery/Penguin Group USA publishes on October 4, 2007.

In Pain Free 1-2-3 (McGraw-Hill, April 2006), Dr. Teitelbaum outlines a step-by-step program that can help anyone identify the source of pain and understand how to alleviate it. Three Steps to Happiness: Healing Through Joy (Deva Press 2003), provides a blueprint for creating and maintaining a natural state of happiness and vitality at any time.

Dr. Teitelbaum lectures to patient, physician and research groups internationally. He is the lead author of groundbreaking "gold standard" research on effective treatment for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Fibromyalgia, which was published in the Journal of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, volume 8, number 2 in 2001.

In April 2002, he was editorialized in the Journal of the American Academy of Pain Management, where his integrative treatment protocol was recognized as "standard of practice" for chronic pain conditions.

His latest study published in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine focused on the effects of a unique 5-carbon sugar called D-ribose for Fibromyalgia patients. The research found that 2/3 of the patients studied showed improvement after only 12 days of therapy. The average increase in energy was 45 percent, with an average 30 percent improvement in well-being. Corvalen, a proprietary D-ribose product of Bioenergy Life Science, Inc., is designed to improve the metabolic health of hearts and muscles and is used to provide nutritional support to sufferers of Fibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), and cardiovascular disease.

Dr. Teitelbaum knows CFS/Fibromyalgia as an insider -- he contracted Chronic Fatigue Syndrome when he was in medical school and had to drop out for a year to recover. In the ensuing 25 years, he dedicated his career to finding effective treatment.

His web site (http://www.endfatigue.com) contains a sophisticated computer program, which can analyze and create a complete medical record of a patient's case to help patients and physicians determine the best course of treatment to get well.

Medical Training - University of Dhaka, Bangladesh, Residency Training - United Kingdom Fellowship Training - University of Massachusetts Medical School, Worchester, and University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria. Professor of Medicine and Rheumatology, Internal Medicine Residency Program. Director, sophomore musculoskeletal and connective tissue disease course; didactic Rheumatology seminar series for residents, bedside teaching during management and teaching rounds; M3 case reports, seminars on physical diagnosis in Rheumatology patients.

Author of over 130 articles and publications, Dr. Yunas has made significant contributions in describing, characterizing and defining fibromyalgia syndrome (FMS), and remains active in the research of this condition. He is particularly interested in the enuroendocrine aspects of FMA and similar syndromes with chronic pain. He enjoys working in investigational study design and writing, including literary writing.