Daily Mail announces CF (CFS?) and fibromyalgia reclassified as BDS by WHO

[Countrygirl]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-4332866/Why-doctors-t-dismiss-symptoms-mind.html

For patients who have no obvious physical cause for their symptoms, trying to get a diagnosis or effective treatment can be a nightmare.

It's a common problem: in as many as one in five cases, doctors find no explanation for a patient's symptoms or for their severity.

Though the symptoms are real, patients can end up being told it's all in their mind.

This will ring all too true for many with conditions such as chronic fatigue, fibro-myalgia (characterised by widespread pain and fatigue), irritable bowel syndrome, unexplained chest pain or interstitial cystitis (not caused by infection).

Not only do these problems, known as functional disorders, cause misery, but they cost the NHS a fortune.

Treating medically unexplained symptoms cost £3.1 billion a year, more than stroke or heart disease.

But research suggests these different diagnoses are all types of a single illness, bodily distress syndrome (BDS) — a new condition that's just been included in the draft of the next World Health Organisation's International Classification of Diseases, the diagnostic bible for doctors.

A study in the British Journal of General Practice last year, based on 1,400 patients, found around 17 per cent would meet the criteria for BDS.

The term is used to describe medically unexplained symptoms, and recognises illness has roots in the body and mind, paving the way for new treatments for many patients who may have been told symptoms were 'in their heads'.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/a...rs-t-dismiss-symptoms-mind.html#ixzz4bxmTNnkY
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[A.B.]

The term is used to describe medically unexplained symptoms, and recognises illness has roots in the body and mind

Where is the evidence that the mind is the cause of disease in these cases?

They're trying to market the idea of the mind being the cause of disease as "progressive", when it is actually regressive: it's old medical superstition. It's just hysteria rebranded. Coupled with denial of the biomedical literature, this ideology is now being revived to serve the agenda of insurance companies and health care systems intent on saving money.

 

[Invisible Woman]

Great....

They'll publish this pile of sh*** and focus on the efforts of moral midgets while ignoring the real science of mental giants like Davis, Naviaux, Staines, Fluge & Mella etc...

 

[Countrygirl]

Do we assume this nonsense is spun by the SMC?

We need @Dx Revision Watch on guard.

 

[Countrygirl]

Professor Per Fink, who leads the research clinic for functional disorders and psycho-somatics at Aarhus, says: 'Grouping such patients under BDS would help them understand the symptoms and treat them.'

I see this particular moral and scientific midget (thank you @Invisible Woman ) is sticking his oar in again.

 

[wdb]

How the hell did they come up with that title "Why doctors can no longer dismiss symptoms as 'all in the mind': Experts reveal medically unexplained conditions can still have a physical cause" It is completely contradictory to everything in the article. Lumping a bunch of unrelated conditions together each likely with different underlying causes and prescribing everybody antidepressants and CBT is precisely dismissing symptoms as 'all in the mind'

 

[Cheesus]

This reminds me of a debate held between Wessley and White:

Introduction

Functional somatic symptoms and syndromes are a major health issue. They are common, costly, persistent and may be disabling. Most of the current literature pertains to specific syndromes defined by medical subspecialties. Indeed, each medical subspecialty seems to have at least one somatic syndrome. These include: irritable bowel syndrome (gastroenterology); chronic pelvic pain (gynaecology); fibromyalgia (rheumatology); non-cardiac chest pain (cardiology); tension headache (neurology); hyperventilation syndrome (respiratory medicine) and chronic fatigue syndrome (infectious disease). In 1999, Wessely and colleagues concluded on the basis of a literature review that there was substantial overlap between these conditions and challenged the acceptance of distinct syndromes as defined in the medical literature (Wessely et al, 1999). They proposed the concept of a general functional somatic syndrome. But is there any empirical evidence for such a general syndrome? Is it even a useful concept? Five years on, Professor Simon Wessely, King's College London, revisits this debate. He is opposed by Dr Peter White from St Bartholomew's Hospital and Queen Mary School of Medicine and Dentistry, London.

http://bjp.rcpsych.org/content/185/2/95

 

[Cheesus]

"Why doctors can no longer dismiss symptoms as 'all in the mind': Experts reveal medically unexplained conditions can still have a physical cause"

Wow! Medically unexplained symptoms can have a physical cause? What an absolute shocker. That would mean doctors don't know everything there is to know about the body, which is frankly difficult to believe.

 

[Barry53]

Psycho babblers trying to plug the gaping holes in their rapidly sinking ship?

 

[Countrygirl]

Psycho babblers trying to plug the gaping holes in their rapidly sinking ship?

I think the UK is prepared to drain the ocean dry rather than allow this particular ship to sink.

 

[Apple]

I like they included interstitial cystitis in there. I'd love to hear more about how they think bleeding and inflamed bladders stem from the mind.

 

[Marco]

I'd love to hear more about how they think bleeding and inflamed bladders stem from the mind.

Mind over bladder?

 

[suseq]

Dear @Rose49, thank you so much for your comment under the article calling out this nonsense. I can't wait for the day your husband and his team, and all the other scientists, doctors and advocates working with and on behalf of the patient community prove these clowns wrong. That day can't come soon enough.

There is nothing scientific or holistic about their approach. It is a purely subjective psychological hypothesis without any objective evidence, and their constant reframing/renaming will not change this fact.

 

[JamBob]

The Aarhus team found there is an overlap in symptoms between different disorders: a patient with fibromyalgia, who experiences widespread pains, may suffer fatigue, while someone with chronic fatigue syndrome can have muscle aches.

This is some dumb logic. Lots of diseases and conditions have overlapping symptoms - it doesn't mean they have the same pathological cause.

 

[alex3619]

How the hell did they come up with that title "Why doctors can no longer dismiss symptoms as 'all in the mind': Experts reveal medically unexplained conditions can still have a physical cause" It is completely contradictory to everything in the article. Lumping a bunch of unrelated conditions together each likely with different underlying causes and prescribing everybody antidepressants and CBT is precisely dismissing symptoms as 'all in the mind'

Ummm, I will give it a label. THB Too Hard Basket. The common diagnostic feature is doctors do not have a clue about what is wrong, even when there are multiple objective tests available. This is not scientifically justified in the slightest extent.

We do need to be careful though in presuming CFS and ME are indeed rebranded here. This was in the daily mail, not an official WHO release.

 

[Binkie4]

http://www.parliament.uk/business/p...nts/written-question/Lords/2017-03-20/HL6204/

Countess of Mar has just asked a written question. Stuff must be happening.

 

[Invisible Woman]

Ummm, I will give it a label. THB Too Hard Basket. The common diagnostic feature is doctors do not have a clue about what is wrong, even when there are multiple objective tests available. This is not scientifically justified in the slightest extent.

We do need to be careful though in presuming CFS and ME are indeed rebranded here. This was in the daily mail, not an official WHO release.

Yep, I agree with the THB - but in the UK, if not outright rebranding, then they are at least dumping us all in the same waste bin. This thread here is very informative about the current state of play in the UK:
http://forums.phoenixrising.me/inde...ening-across-the-uk.48710/page-24#post-825162

The thing with these devious b*****s is that they are ...well...devious... today it's shove us all in the same basket, a basket which encourages doctors to stop testing and start assuming and then, well, then tomorrow: well, we might as well stick the same label on them anyway. This is simply the opening shot....

 

[alex3619]

This is some dumb logic. Lots of diseases and conditions have overlapping symptoms - it doesn't mean they have the same pathological cause.

[Satire] Let us solve this diagnostic dilemma right now. There are only four major symptoms in existence - pain, fatigue, depression and anxiety. Therefore there are only four diseases, though in acute and chronic forms. Guess what they are? So Chronic Fatigue would cover ME, though with a touch of chronic depression and chronic pain.

Since only biopsychosocial doctors have the expertise to deal with all these domains, then it follows we don't need the other doctors. Close up your practices, turn all hospitals into psych hospitals, and you can slash the medical costs of the world by a huge margin. Bargain. Medical insurers and governments will surely agree.

[End Satire]

Let us not go back to diagnosis by broad symptoms while ignoring details of patient medical history and presentation. There is a reason why the NIMH is working on a scientific diagnostic construct and hoping to ditch the DSM and the ICD equivalents. There is plentiful evidence of clear physical pathophysiology in many of these disorders, including ME. Otherwise are we going to reintroduce Wasting Disease, aka cancer?

This is akin to medical populism. Its not science, but borrows from medical management practices, as in the business side of things.

 

[Chrisb]

As we know items appearing in the Daily Mail may be 16 years out of date. Perhaps this is just a hidden "Guess the year" challenge.

 

[alex3619]

Yep, I agree with the THB - but in the UK, if not outright rebranding, then they are at least dumping us all in the same waste bin.

Not just in the UK, though arguably that is the worst place, but even here in Australia there are signs this is happening, albeit slowly.