Development of a Polyphenol-rich Dietary Preparation for Treating Veterans With Gulf War Illness

Gulf War Illness (GWI) is a multi-symptom disorder that is characterized by complex traits. Clinical complications of GWI typically persist over long-term, cause significant pain and suffering, and interfere with the ability of affected Veterans to successfully integrate back into civilian society. There is no treatment for GWI and there is an urgent need to develop novel interventions either to resolve underlying GWI mechanisms, or to alleviate major GWI clinical complications.

Recent Evidence highlights the potential value of flavonoids, a subclass of organic chemical called polyphenols that are abundantly found in some plants and common dietary preparations may help alleviate chronic fatigue and preserve cognitive functions. Based on this, the overall goal is to test whether the potential efficacy of dietary supplementation with a commercially available flavonoid-rich product, alleviates clinical complications in Veterans with GWI. In particular, the researchers propose a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled Phase I/IIA study to test the feasibility and potential efficacy of Concord grape juice dietary supplementation to treat cognitive deficits and chronic fatigue in Veterans with GWI.

Inclusion criteria

• Gulf War Veterans deployed to the Persian Gulf theatre between August 1990 and August 1991. GWI will be defined according to the Kansas Case Definition. The Kansas Case Definition identifies 6 symptom domains and requires endorsement of moderately severe and/or multiple symptoms in at least 3 of those domains. To meet the case definition, the Veterans must also indicate that each symptom first became problematic during or within one year of the Gulf War.

Exclusion criteria

• Individuals not meeting the inclusion criteria for Gulf War deployment and definition of GWI, or with conditions that might interfere with their ability to report their symptoms (e.g., drug use) are excluded.
• Additional exclusion criteria are current medical conditions that may explain the symptoms (diabetes, heart disease, among others) or significant current (in the past six months) unstable (requiring significant medication adjustments or hospitalization) psychiatric conditions, including suicidal or homicidal ideation, schizophrenia or bipolar disorder according to subject responses to the interview and review by the principal investigator.
• Subjects who usually consume abnormally high contents of dietary polyphenol based on a self-reported diet diary will be excluded.