"News" 8 Sep 2016: PACE trial team analyse main outcome measures according to the original protocol

[worldbackwards]

Good point, I hope the authors will now publish in a journal to set the scientific record straight.

I admire your optimism.

 

[Dolphin]

The results don't look nearly so good according to the protocol

View attachment 17186

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/773947814233698304

Note the Lancet paper and the protocol use very different definitions of improver, but I guess that's the whole point.

The latest reports don't give the figures for improvements they reported in the Lancet (included in the graph above). A very important omission in my book. Basically more spin.

 

[Sean]

Not sure what if they promised anything under 2.5 year follow-up data.
Though I'm pretty sure they collected employment data but so far we haven't seen any.

Take your point, and my phrasing was ambiguous. But if the main paper's results are going to be re-analysed using the original protocol thresholds, then the important recovery and follow-up papers' results should be too.

 

[lilpink]

This is no substitute for the data that they should have released, that we asked them to release and the court said they should release. We still don't have the true facts from them.

Presumably they think this will negate the need for them to release the raw data. Idiots! I have to wonder what we're really not seeing. After all we knew it was going to be dodgy..giving us this fills me with no confidence at all (obviously). I'd like to see how the data was actually gathered. I still wonder if they could have purloined data from the NOD... What are they so afraid of?

 

[TiredSam]

It's important that people don't get carried away just yet. I think an independent analysis of PACE will be much more damning, and we should not be content with letting PACE authors interpret their own results, regardless of the protocol used.

Not much chance of that, the only analysis that anyone's interested now is one done by scientists that we trust. The PACE authors hardly fit that description, anything they do now is just free entertainment.

 

[snowathlete]

OK, I must admit that I am not that clued up on the protocols for publishing research data, but isn't this rather odd in that respect. There is no mention of this being published in a scientific journal and no suggestion that it is a pre-print. Would this sort of thing not usually be submitted as at least a formal letter to a journal or a comment on an online paper? Does it count as science if it is not formally published?

Won't even The Lancet touch this now?

My guess is that they didn't have time. Even with the Lancet's fact track review process they couldn't get it out before the rest of the data is released that will show how bad Recovery is. Or maybe no one would touch it because it's so appalling?

 

[alex3619]

I have not read this thread yet, but I thought I would share with you my first thought after skimming it online. Its a joke, right?

 

[worldbackwards]

Its a joke, right?

One ongoing since about 2003. But in its defence it does appear to be approaching the punchline.

 

[alex3619]

Conclusion: CBT and GET are effective treatments! So nothing has changed. They win!

I think most will recognize this as satirical, but you might want to add something to that effect for anyone in deep brain fog.

 

[alex3619]

Additionally, they used a modified Fukuda that only required symptoms for 1 week, not 6 months, which they acknowledged might not be accurate.

Modifying definitions so the new technical definition is more likely to give the results they want is their modus operandi.

 

[alex3619]

How very House of Cards. Not scientists, spin doctors.

As I have said before, promotion by rhetoric and claim, not evidence and reason. Having a public relations organization, oh, sorry, the SMC, on their side and promoting their view does not help their case either. The data has to be released. If the results are good it will show it. If they are not good it will show that too.

 

[JES]

Presumably they think this will negate the need for them to release the raw data. Idiots! I have to wonder what we're really not seeing. After all we knew it was going to be dodgy..giving us this fills me with no confidence at all (obviously). I'd like to see how the data was actually gathered. I still wonder if they could have purloined data from the NOD... What are they so afraid of?

I think the sudden release of today's analysis is more likely an indicator that they will release the data. It seems unlikely to me that they would rush to release these documents for another reason after years of ignoring their critics, the timing seems too delicate to be a co-incidence.

 

[alex3619]

Based on this analysis and their strange behaviour / appetite for endless litigation, I think it's safe to assume that recovery rates were in the 0% range.

Not safe, but good enough to bet on.

 

[alex3619]

Won't even The Lancet touch this now?

If this is damage control they would have wanted it out immediately.

 

[alex3619]

Good point, I hope the authors will now publish in a journal to set the scientific record straight.

They probably cannot publish this specific paper as its already public. They would need to write a new one.

 

[trishrhymes]

I hope someone will show the graph comparing the 2011 'improvers' data next to these new figures to the newly resigned principal of QMUL, so he can use them as grounds for dismissal of White on grounds of gross misconduct and bringing the University into disrepute!

Surely now all the PACE papers will have to be withdrawn.

And when the data comes out we can see how many of the poor souls on which this travesty of science was inflicted actually got worse in each group, and how many, if any recovered.

And all the researchers involved will lose their jobs and reputations.

And the NICE guidelines will be changed.

And all the doctors, therapists inflicting these treatments on patients will be retrained.

And the MAGENTA trial and GETSET will be cancelled....

And the media and doctors will apologise and get it right about ME....

No, don't wake me up, I'm having such a lovely dream....

 

[Yogi]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/773934933479985152

Sharpe has been very busy deleting dozens of tweets that responded to him regarding this.

Use the vexatious and abusive #pacetrial (which Sharpe has used himself now) in any response so can be seen by everyone and a record of it will be kept in twitter timeline.

 

[Esther12]

Sharpe has been very busy deleting dozens of tweets that responded to him regarding this.

I don't think that's how twitter works, is it? He can't delete other people's tweets.

 

[Bob]

Only an additional 5% of patients improved in physical function when CBT was given in addition to SMC. This difference between treatments was not significant, so CBT failed to improve physical function when using the pre-planned trial analysis.

 

[Bob]

I don't think that's how twitter works, is it? He can't delete other people's tweets.

He can only delete his own tweets and he can block people.