On 12-13 May, the "International ME/CFS Conference 2025 - Understand, Diagnose, Treat" took place in Berlin, organised by the Charité Fatigue Center in collaboration with the ME/CFS Research Foundation. Worldwide renowned researchers from Europe, the USA, Israel and Japan presented and discussed their latest research findings.
The hybrid conference was aimed at the medical and research community, including doctors, medical professionals, researchers and interdisciplinary experts from the fields of medicine and biology. More than 4000 people participated in the event, including over 200 people who took part on site.
Videos, presentations and summaries of the lectures are now available on demand on the event website. The conference was held in English Short summaries (German and English) have been provided in cooperation with the German Association for ME/CFS (external link to website of the German Association for ME/CFS). For the videos, automated subtitles can be generated via Youtube.
Due to restrictions relating to unpublished data from ongoing research, some videos and presentations will be published at a later date or, in individual cases, cannot be shown.
In addition to oral presentations, more than 40 scientific posters were exhibited at the conference. A virtual poster gallery is available online (access to the poster gallery is only granted to online conference participants who previously registered, in accordance with the event policy agreed upon by the organising committee).
Out of all the poster submissions, three outstanding posters were selected by a scientific jury and awarded poster prizes by the ME/CFS Research Foundation:
- 1. prize: Anouk Slaghekke (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam): Microvascular Dysfunction and Basal Membrane Thickening in Skeletal Muscle in ME/CFS and Post-COVID: from Pathology to Diagnosis
- 2. prize: Guido Cammà (Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin): Functional Connectivity Alterations in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: MRI Findings from a Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy Observational Trial
- 3. prize: Timon Kuchler (Technical University of Munich): Prolonged Endothelial Dysfunction in Post-COVID Syndrome Patients Compared to COVID-19 Recovered and SARS-CoV-2 Naive Individuals – Insights from the “All Eyes on PCS Study”
Under the scientific stewardship of Prof Carmen Scheibenbogen, Director of the Department of Immunodeficiency and Post-Infectious Diseases and the Charité Fatigue Center (CFC) at Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, the “International ME/CFS Conference 2025” once again brought together leading experts to present the latest research findings. Conference participants discussed the needs and advances in medical care and focused in particular on the current state of knowledge about the disease mechanisms, from cardiovascular dysregulation and mitochondrial pathology to immune dysregulation and autoimmunity. A major focus of the conference was the presentation of latest results from clinical trials to highlight global efforts to develop curative treatment options. Speakers' contributions focused on ME/CFS, but also addressed research on Long COVID and post-COVID Syndrome.
In order to inform patients and the general public about ongoing ME/CFS research projects in Germany, CFC and the ME/CFS Research Foundation organised a separate event on 13 May 2025 titled “ME/CFS Symposium 2025 – Research and Healthcare Studies in Germany”. The event took place as an online livestream in German. Videos and summaries of the presentations are available on the ME/CFS Symposium 2025 Website .
The ME/CFS Research Foundation organises and funds these specialist events as part of our commitment to connecting leading researchers and informing the public about the latest research. Summaries and video recordings from last year's ME/CFS Conference 2023 and ME/CFS Symposium 2023 are available on our website.
In May 2026, the “International ME/CFS Conference 2026” and the “ME/CFS Symposium 2026” will take place. Updates on these events will be announced in due time on our website and via our newsletter (link to subscription).
How can you support the work of the ME/CFS Research Foundation?
There is still a long way to go before diagnosis, care and treatment of ME/CFS patients will one day become a medical and social standard. We at the ME/CFS Research Foundation are focussing on biomedical research, which we see as the key element in solving these problems (more on this in our research funding strategy and in our half year report summer 2025, which summarises our activities). To do this, we need extensive support from private donors – those affected, relatives, families, friends, associations, schools, networks, companies, initiatives, event organisers and all supporters. And if you are not able to provide direct support, you can share our story and motivate others to help. Because only together can such a feat be achieved.
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