Cytokine signature in chronic fatigue syndrome

[hixxy]

Cytokine signature in chronic fatigue syndrome

1. Megan E. Roerink,
2. Matthew Buckland,
3. Andrew R. Lloyd,
4. Jos W. M. van der Meer

1. aRadboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6500 HB, The Netherlands;
2. bBarts Health Trust, London E1 1BB, United Kingdom;
3. cKirby Institute, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia

One of the major findings in the publication by Montoya et al. (1) on cytokine signatures in chronic fatigue syndrome is elevation of circulating TGF-β in patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). Unfortunately, the materials and methods of ref. 1 do not give much information on how the controls were recruited, and how the blood samples …

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2017/10/26/1714011114
http://sci-hub.io/10.1073/pnas.1714011114

An attempt to discredit this study by Montoya, et al:

Cytokine signature associated with disease severity in chronic fatigue syndrome patients.

 

[Diwi9]

Hoping someone with full access to the article will post soon!

 

[hixxy]

Hoping someone with full access to the article will post soon!

Just click on the sci-hub link in my post.

 

[Rick Sanchez]

Just in case people do not know who ''Jos W. M. van der Meer'' is.

From his wiki page

As a clinician confronted with patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), van der Meer was intrigued by their suffering. Since 1989 together with Gijs Bleijenberg and Jochem MD Galama, he performed research trying to understand CFS. Major findings are:

• There is no evidence for a role of persistent infection (such as enteroviral infection, Epstein Barr virus infection, and as most recently established XMRV infection) In a television interview since Lo et al. he has admitted that the positive study was earthshaking.
• There are important perpetuating psychological factors, which can be addressed with cognitive behaviour therapy(CBT)
• Successful CBT means recovery
• CFS seems to be a central disorder of bodily perception
• Fluoxetine, nutritional supplements, Acclydine and Ondansetron are not effective in CFS (based on our RCTs)
• There is a loss of grey matter in the brain of CFS patients and this is at least partially reversible with successful CBT.[12]

Is this some sort of fucking joke? Successful CBT = recovery in CFS patients? CFS seems to be a central disorder of BODILY PERCEPTION!?!?!

To be honest, the Dutch CFS researchers seem by far to be the worst of the lot when it comes to the British, Dutch and Danish holy trinity of CBT / GET idiocy.

Quite a career this guy has, when almost everything he has researched about a disease has turned out to be wrong. Hope this guy lives long enough to see all his findings go up in smoke.

Of course, that being said, you still have to base the validity of their criticism on their arguments, and not on the fact that they are a bunch of knobs.

 

[Londinium]

Isn't this the same team that raised a load of objections to the Naviaux paper, or am I misremembering? Clearly they have an axe to grind.

That said, the question they raise about equipment used to quantify TGF-beta is an interesting one and one that I would like to see Montoya's response on. Should be easily batted away if he (as is likely) didn't use different equipment for patients and controls.

 

[hixxy]

@Londinium Yes.

 

[A.B.]

Where nervous psychobabblers cite a TGF-beta study that did not meet minimum standards of quality control to raise doubt about the validity of a study that threatens their precious psychosocial model.

 

[Art Vandelay]

Just in case people do not know who ''Jos W. M. van der Meer'' is.
...
Of course, that being said, you still have to base the validity of their criticism on their arguments, and not on the fact that they are a bunch of knobs.

And Lloyd's pockets are brimming with taxpayer funding for his woo-woo, new age BPS clinic here in Australia too. The last thing he wants is for the BPS model to be consigned to the dustbin once and for all.

 

[Simon]

I’m all for challenging methodology in published research, but Roerink and colleagues said the plasma finding could be due to contamination from platelet-derived TGF-beta, explaining the pitfalls in plasma preparation. Which is a bit odd as Montoya and co looked at serum, not plasma.
More detail in the other place.
https://www.s4me.info/index.php?thr...and-mark-daviss-cytokine-work.607/#post-10286but

 

[Londinium]

Montoya et al have replied to Roerink et al.

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2017/10/26/1714692114.short

tl;dr - none of your criticisms as to methodology are valid and thus the TGF-beta findings are still robust.