Does Esther Crawley’s latest research really tell us anything about prevalence of pediatric CFS/ME

[jimells]

I think from Crawleys own perspective it gives a nice platform for her own work on fatigue in kids with a slight emphasis for further study on adverse life events & mood.

Psychs are no more qualified to study "fatigue" than they are to study foot pain from diabetes: they are both sensations resulting from biochemical processes, not "bad behavior" or "thinking the wrong thoughts".

 

[alex3619]

These researchers talk about chronic fatique it isn't CFS and ME.

What, you mean this isn't true? :-

ME=CFS=PVFS=CF=mono=herpes infection=viral infection=infection=bacterial infection=Lyme=tick born illnesses=parasites=politicians=cultists=psychobabblers ???

I am shocked I tell you, shocked. How can this be? How can vague and loose word association not be absolute truth!

[Sarcasm/Satire]

 

[halcyon]

I think the criteria for the upcoming MAGENTA trial - who is funding that? - needs careful watch.

It's being funded by the NIHR.

 

[Snow Leopard]

I don't have a problem with publishing such research - I do however have a problem with claiming the results give any sort of reliable estimate of chronic fatigue OR chronic fatigue syndrome. I have an even greater problem with the ridiculous spin in the media...

These are the sorts of studies that you do before you try to get a grant to do a decent study. No one hands out funding if you have no results at all on which to justify a study. (I'm not however suggesting that they have known plans to do a proper study).

 

[halcyon]

I don't have a problem with publishing such research

If they had used actual accepted CFS criteria then I wouldn't have as much of a problem with it, but they didn't.

These are the sorts of studies that you do before you try to get a grant to do a decent study.

If this was why she did it then she is a very dishonest person. If she's interested in studying chronic fatigue then she could have said that and not CFS. Instead what it looks like is that she used dubious criteria to overblow the prevalence of CFS in children in order to increase her odds of receiving funding.

 

[Snow Leopard]

If they had used actual accepted CFS criteria then I wouldn't have as much of a problem with it, but they didn't.

Yes, it is a problem to claim that it represented "CFS" rather than simply (chronic) fatigue due to unspecified causes...