Science: Criticism mounts of a long, controversial chronic fatigue study

[Yogi]

http://news.sciencemag.org/health/2015/10/criticism-mounts-long-controversial-chronic-fatigue-study

 

[leela]

"“It’s sometimes quite hard to understand what motivates the very vocal minority that gets so upset about this apparently benign bit of moderately helpful treatment,” he said."

I can't even.
Too many levels of BS in one sentence.

 

[alex3619]

On the new study:

After analyzing the responses, the researchers concluded that the benefits reported in the original study, which assessed participants at 1 year, were maintained for at least another 1.5 years. But the participants randomized to receive the two interventions that initially did nothing also improved, and there “was little evidence of differences in outcomes” when compared with the people in the other treatment groups. The authors suggest that this is because the people in the ineffective groups later decided to seek out graded exercise and cognitive behavior therapy.

I would argue that it means any improvement was pure artifact, representing methodological bias, and that the real outcome is reflected in the new data. Nothing.

 

[alex3619]

Two other interventions tested, so-called specialist medical care .. did not help.

Did he even read the study? If he did that would be even worse, as this statement in a big problem if you believe the usefulness of the data collected.

 

[alex3619]

Does anyone have a reference for this new study showing no difference at follow-up?

PS http://forums.phoenixrising.me/inde...me-long-term-follow-up-from-pace-trial.40817/

 

[anciendaze]

Wait a minute! Are they now claiming CBT and GET were only "moderately helpful treatment". That does not square with rhetoric about "recovery" and "back to normal". If you doubt they used those words, check me.

Now, check the number of people referred for treatment as "CFS" patients, 3158, from which group the authors selected a much smaller number, of whom only 640 completed the study. Most of these showed negligible improvement. The authors themselves described some 40% as non-responders. Nobody else has been allowed to make such estimates.

Whatever they were treating, it was not the vast majority of "CFS" patients, as understood by NHS physicians. Now, look for the cost of testing those 3158 patients to eliminate those with organic conditions from the study. You won't find it because that cost was externalized to the NHS.

Since all patients in PACE received specialist medical care (SMC) which is standard for the NHS we have a real can of worms in figuring out the total cost of treatment. All we can say for certain is that PACE spent an additional 5,000,000 pounds for treatment which even enthusiasts now describe as "moderately helpful". Those lazy patients merely put in a full year of complying with treatment protocols to receive, at best, no improvement in physical performance, employment, need for services, etc.

If you don't care about the patients you might at least care about the impact on the UK healthcare budget if this group continues to roll out this treatment protocol to the other 80-90% of UK patients labeled as "CFS" patients.

 

[Sean]

re they now claiming CBT and GET were only "moderately helpful treatment".

The back pedalling is going to be awesome.

 

[Valentijn]

The back pedalling is going to be awesome.

With the amount of expertise a lot of BPS practitioners will soon achieve, perhaps we should request that back-peddling become an Olympic sport?