Daisymay
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http://www.meactionuk.org.uk/Bowel-problems-in-ME.CFS.htm
Bowel problems in ME/CFS
Margaret Williams 9th August 2014
For those battling to convince their permanent health insurers (PHI) that
irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a known component of ME/CFS and that
neither IBS nor ME/CFS is a functional somatic disorder (and thus excluded
from benefit), recent evidence should help dispel any doubt about the
organic nature of their disorder(s).
It is a matter of record that the basis of the Wessely Schools beliefs
about CFS/ME upon which the PACE trial was based is that, together with
fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome, atypical chest pain and multiple
chemical sensitivity, CFS/ME is but one functional somatic syndrome (ie. a
behavioural / somatisation disorder with no grounding in organic pathology)
which, due to an artefact of medical specialisation, naïve clinicians fail
to recognise and thus treat as different disorders (S Wessely, C Nimnuan, M
Sharpe, Lancet 1999:354:936-939; S Wessely, Psychol Med 1990:20:35-53). This
is what has been taught to medical students for the last three decades.
Furthermore, during the consultation period for the NICE Clinical Guideline
CG53 on CFS that was published in August 2007, Professor Peter Whites
psychiatric unit at St Bartholomews Hospital stated: " ..gut
anti-spasmodics.. are not treatments of CFS/ME since bowel symptoms are not
part of CFS/ME (SH St Bartholomew's Hospital Chronic Fatigue
Services 85 FULL 229 6.4.5.5)....
In a study supported by Action for ME, in 1996 it was demonstrated by MJG
Farthing, Professor of Gastroenterology at St. Bartholomews Hospital, that
there was a prevalence of 63% of IBS in CFS sufferers (Journal of the
Royal College of Physicians of London 1996:30:6:512-513). This greatly
exceeds the prevalence of IBS of up to 22% in the general population....
Read full article here.
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