Post-Exposure Syndromes as State-Space Trapping: A set-theoretic perspective on PSSD and the post-exposure family.
April 2026
in “
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
”
TLDR Post-exposure syndromes are persistent conditions caused by past exposures, needing unique interventions.
The document presents a set-theoretic perspective on Post-Exposure Syndromes (PES), such as Post-SSRI Sexual Dysfunction (PSSD), post-finasteride syndrome, Long COVID, ME/CFS, PTSD, and Gulf War illness. These conditions are characterized by chronic, multisystem symptoms that persist after the initial exposure is cleared. The author, Antonei B. Csoka, argues that these syndromes form a coherent family with a topological structure, rather than a molecular one. The framework suggests that these syndromes are trapped states in a high-dimensional organismic state space, exited only by non-ordinary perturbations. The study proposes that exposure history and order are crucial, and aging is viewed as the cumulative effect of exposures over time. The implications for pharmacovigilance include reforming adverse-event reporting, establishing surveillance cohorts, updating informed-consent language, and focusing on exposure history.