Multiple chemical sensitivity syndrome: a clinical perspective. II. Evaluation, diagnostic testing, treatment, and social considerations.

Abstract

Multiple chemical sensitivity syndrome (MCS) does not appear to fit established principles of toxicology. Social, political, and economic forces are demanding that MCS be defined medically, even though scientific studies have failed as yet to identify pathogenic mechanisms for the condition or any objective diagnostic criteria. Consequently, a working definition of MCS can only rely on a person's subjective symptoms of distress and attribution to environmental exposures rather than currently measurable objective evidence of disease. Nevertheless, patients labeled with MCS are clearly distressed and many are functionally disabled. Without reconciling the different theories of etiology of MCS discussed in Part I of this report, and recognizing that the cause of the syndrome may be multifactorial, strategies are proposed for clinical evaluation and management of patients with MCS using a biopsychosocial model of illness. The social implications of this illness are also discussed.