Shortly after the Gulf War in 1990–1991, service men and women began reporting multiple symptoms ranging from persistent headaches, widespread pain, chronic fatigue, cognitive dysfunction, mood dysregulation, gastrointestinal issues, skin abnormalities, and respiratory problems. This prompted the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to initially classify the disorder as chronic multi-symptom illness (CMI), where it later became known as Gulf War Illness (GWI). Researchers and healthcare professionals since the early 1990s have been working extensively on alleviating the symptoms expressed in GWI as well as attempting to understand the mechanisms behind this illness. Scientific literature as well as reports from GWI veterans indicate that the toxic exposures during deployment may be responsible for the symptoms. These toxic exposures potentially include nerve agents, pyridostigmine bromide pills, pesticides, munitions with depleted uranium, and burning oil well fires. GWI currently affects 25–32 % of the 697,000 American troops who were stationed overseas during the short conflict. The purpose of this paper is to review the literature on neurotoxic exposures in Gulf War Illness, to explain how these exposures may lead to glutamate excitotoxicity, which has been implicated in the majority of the symptoms characterizing the illness, and to propose a novel treatment option for GWI.

在1990年至1991年海湾战争之后不久，服役的男女开始报告多种症状，包括持续性头痛，广泛的疼痛，慢性疲劳，认知功能障碍，情绪失调，胃肠道疾病，皮肤异常和呼吸道疾病。这促使疾病控制与预防中心（CDC）最初将该疾病归类为慢性多症状疾病（CMI），后来又被称为海湾战争疾病（GWI）。自1990年代初期以来，研究人员和医疗保健专业人员一直在广泛致力于减轻GWI中表现出的症状以及试图了解这种疾病背后的机制。科学文献以及GWI退伍军人的报告表明，部署期间的有毒暴露可能是症状的原因。这些有毒的暴露可能包括神经毒剂，溴化斯的明溴丸，杀虫剂，贫铀弹药和燃烧的油井大火。在短暂的冲突期间，驻守在海外的697,000名美军中，GWI目前影响着25％至32％。本文的目的是回顾有关海湾战争疾病中神经毒性暴露的文献，以解释这些暴露如何导致谷氨酸兴奋性毒性（已与该疾病的大多数症状有关），并提出了一种新颖的治疗方案对于GWI。