Uninterpretable: Fatal flaws in PACE Chronic Fatigue Syndrome follow-up study
It's a long read. Here's the summary:
It's a long read. Here's the summary:
- The PACE investigators sacrificed any possibility of meaningful long-term follow-up by breaking protocol and issuing patient testimonials about CBT before accrual was even completed.
- This already fatal flaw was compounded with a loose recommendation for treatment after the intervention phase of the trial ended. The investigators provide poor documentation of which treatment was taken up by which patients and whether there was crossover in the treatment being received during follow up.
- Investigators’ attempts to correct methodological issues with statistical strategies lapses into voodoo statistics.
- The primary outcome self-report variables are susceptible to manipulation, investigator preferences for particular treatments, peer pressure, and confounding with mental health variables.
- The Pace investigators exploited ambiguities in the design and execution of their trial with self-congratulatory, confirmatory bias.
Last edited: