Sure, but name isn't the only thing that makes a difference. To say that it makes a difference isn't to say that it should be a top priority for patients or advocates...
If it makes a big difference in how we're diagnosed and treated, then of course it would be a priority. I wouldn't presume it did, and in fact I said very similar things before I read that study. It wasn't as though I thought it didn't matter, it was more like I thought it couldn't possibly have important and concrete consequences in the real world. L Jason designs good studies. When I read what he wrote, I couldn't deny that what we choose to call this illness does, in fact, have real consequences in the real world.
I suspect this has less to do with the name and more with the socio-economic differences between countries where different usages are prevalent. For instance, all the insanity stemming from England isn't due to how ME vs CFS is used there.
This doesn't follow, necessarily. It isn't the name itself... ah, okay, I think I've caught your perspective, here. Let me clarify what I'm saying.
I don't believe it's the name itself that instantly creates the stigma behind the illness. I think there are many factors there. However, people who like to stigmatize ME sufferers tend to use CFS because
they are aware (in the US) of the public's associations, or simply
believe it sounds less serious, or are
ill-informed enough to not know or care what patients prefer. That all ties in to why CFS articles show up very differently in my inbox than ME articles. People who use ME/CFS or ME automatically
know more about the illness,
view it as a 'real thing' (Chalder calls it CFS/ME or 'chronic fatigue' when she's speaking, at least in an article that quoted her recently) and tend to
know what patients prefer.
Regardless of
why articles about CFS show up very differently from those that use ME, they do so. This means that CFS is associated with a picture of a less-serious illness in the public consciousness.
And this has a strong enough impact on medical professionals that, when two patients have the exact same history, name, and symptoms, clinicians are more likely to view 'ME' as an illness you can't recover from that the patient cannot help having, whereas they are more likely to believe patients with 'CFS' will recover with effort.
It makes a difference in the paper, it makes a difference in the clinic. It makes a difference.
Trust me, I wish it really didn't. When you go country-to-country it does get more complicated. However, each country in which there is any doubt that ME is an embodied illness has a name problem, even if it's not exactly the same name-problem.
-J