mango
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Absolutely devastating news for people with ME and/or FM in Sweden: The Gottfries Clinic in Mölndal will no longer be allowed to treat ME or Fibromyalgia patients 
The Gottfries Clinic is a biomedical ME and Fibromyalgia specialist clinic. It was opened in 1998, while professor Gottfries himself has been studying ME since the 1950s. They do clinical research as well, and it's part of their current contract to educate medical professionals in the region.
There are only two public healthcare ME/CFS specialist clinics in Sweden today (Gottfries and Stora Sköndal) and one private clinic (Gotahälsan).
This is an enormous loss to PWME all over the country... a massive setback...
The background, in short: Three public healthcare physicians (GPs?) filed an official complaint to IVO, The Health and Social Care Inspectorate, sometime before March 2015, objecting to Gottfries offering ME patients B12 injections as a part of their treatment ("Not evidence based!"). They also object to the part of the contract that states that after initial investigation, diagnosis and treatment at the Gottfries clinic, patients will be sent back to the primary healthcare centers who from then on will be responsible for continuing their care, treatments, writing the necessary papers for sickness benefit/compensation, insurance purposes etc.
According to a decision made by the public health politicians (Västra hälso- och sjukvårdsnämnden, en av fem hälso- och sjukvårdsnämnder i VG-regionen) on September 30, when Gottfries' current contract runs out on 30 November 2016 ME/FM patients will from then on only be offered care and treatment "with a clear bio-psycho-social direction".
In the details about the new procurement protocol (I don't know the correct word... "upphandlingsunderlag" in Swedish?) it says it has to be "in line with national and international models, with a clear bio-psycho-social direction, evidence based for patients with medically unexplained symptoms (MUS) and/or chronic non-malignant pain".
According to the minutes of the meeting, this decision was based on "Dialogues with the current service provider and a legal expert. Information and criticism from the Social Insurance Agency (Försäkringskassan), research, medical guidelines, and national and international guidelines have also been considered."
They then go on to say that "there's a center in Denmark that is fully comparable [...] Forskningsklinikken for funktionelle lidelser." (FFL) That's Per Fink's center!! You might recognise his name from the ongoing Karina Hansen horror story... ...and that FFL "offers consultations, training for healthcare professionals incl physicians, and video lectures on the Internet, as well as recent and ongoing research.", "The training covers, among other things, an intro course on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) that has proven to be a successful way to treat difficult cases with functional symptoms." As you probably are aware, the FFL uses the TERM-model, which obviously only makes it even more appalling...
Needless to say, this is the stuff of nightmares... absolutely horrifying.
(I believe I'm not the only one suspecting that there's much more to this story than what's in the official documents... Closing down a whole well established clinic simply for being too generous with the vitamins??)
RME, the Swedish National Association for ME patients, is already hard at work trying to find possible solutions, to have this decision changed. However, it's a huge challenge and a very difficult task for a relatively small group of people already struggling to keep up...
Ideas and suggestions would be hugely and warmly appreciated!
Here's an advocacy page in Swedish, it will be regularly updated with the latest news:
Rädda Gottfriesmottagningen ("Save the Gottfries Clinic")
https://www.facebook.com/RaddaGottfriesmottagningen
The Gottfries Clinic is a biomedical ME and Fibromyalgia specialist clinic. It was opened in 1998, while professor Gottfries himself has been studying ME since the 1950s. They do clinical research as well, and it's part of their current contract to educate medical professionals in the region.
There are only two public healthcare ME/CFS specialist clinics in Sweden today (Gottfries and Stora Sköndal) and one private clinic (Gotahälsan).
This is an enormous loss to PWME all over the country... a massive setback...
The background, in short: Three public healthcare physicians (GPs?) filed an official complaint to IVO, The Health and Social Care Inspectorate, sometime before March 2015, objecting to Gottfries offering ME patients B12 injections as a part of their treatment ("Not evidence based!"). They also object to the part of the contract that states that after initial investigation, diagnosis and treatment at the Gottfries clinic, patients will be sent back to the primary healthcare centers who from then on will be responsible for continuing their care, treatments, writing the necessary papers for sickness benefit/compensation, insurance purposes etc.
According to a decision made by the public health politicians (Västra hälso- och sjukvårdsnämnden, en av fem hälso- och sjukvårdsnämnder i VG-regionen) on September 30, when Gottfries' current contract runs out on 30 November 2016 ME/FM patients will from then on only be offered care and treatment "with a clear bio-psycho-social direction".
In the details about the new procurement protocol (I don't know the correct word... "upphandlingsunderlag" in Swedish?) it says it has to be "in line with national and international models, with a clear bio-psycho-social direction, evidence based for patients with medically unexplained symptoms (MUS) and/or chronic non-malignant pain".
According to the minutes of the meeting, this decision was based on "Dialogues with the current service provider and a legal expert. Information and criticism from the Social Insurance Agency (Försäkringskassan), research, medical guidelines, and national and international guidelines have also been considered."
They then go on to say that "there's a center in Denmark that is fully comparable [...] Forskningsklinikken for funktionelle lidelser." (FFL) That's Per Fink's center!! You might recognise his name from the ongoing Karina Hansen horror story...
...and that FFL "offers consultations, training for healthcare professionals incl physicians, and video lectures on the Internet, as well as recent and ongoing research.", "The training covers, among other things, an intro course on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) that has proven to be a successful way to treat difficult cases with functional symptoms." As you probably are aware, the FFL uses the TERM-model, which obviously only makes it even more appalling...Needless to say, this is the stuff of nightmares... absolutely horrifying.
(I believe I'm not the only one suspecting that there's much more to this story than what's in the official documents... Closing down a whole well established clinic simply for being too generous with the vitamins??
)RME, the Swedish National Association for ME patients, is already hard at work trying to find possible solutions, to have this decision changed. However, it's a huge challenge and a very difficult task for a relatively small group of people already struggling to keep up...
Ideas and suggestions would be hugely and warmly appreciated!
Here's an advocacy page in Swedish, it will be regularly updated with the latest news:
Rädda Gottfriesmottagningen ("Save the Gottfries Clinic")
https://www.facebook.com/RaddaGottfriesmottagningen
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