• Welcome to Phoenix Rising!

    Created in 2008, Phoenix Rising is the largest and oldest forum dedicated to furthering the understanding of and finding treatments for complex chronic illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia (FM), long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.

    To become a member, simply click the Register button at the top right.

James Coyne: Should authors declare a conflict of interest...

Messages
15,786
Isn´t White the one with connections to insurance companies?
And who never declared them to patients when recruiting for the PACE trial, thus violating the patients' right to give informed consent as described in international medical ethics laws.


Firstly I think it should be private, secondly, isn't it the very opposite of a 'conflict' of interests?

What would the illness be conflicting with?
I agree completely. My comment on Coyne's blog:
How would being a patient ever be a conflict of interest? A conflict of interest is something that causes someone to biased in a manner which risks undercutting the science in favor of something else – such as profit, career, or reputation. Patients are the least conflicted group anyone will come across, as they benefit most from the honest science, and are harmed by any deviation from it.

White, Chalder, and Sharpe’s objections rather read like they are trying to undercut Geraghty as a researcher, because “you know, crazy patients!”


So two official or unofficial complaints thus far directly to my University - something I consider a form a bullying and harassment, which is deeply upsetting to me and rather shocking.
I think their attempt to publicly out you and undermine you as a patient with their ridiculous COI accusation is exactly bullying. They have not demonstrated that being a patient is commonly considered a COI, nor presented any evidence of why it should be. In fact, I'm pretty sure I've even mentioned my disease as a possible COI when submitting commentary for publication, and it's been omitted by the journal as presumably not being an actual COI.

Instead, the PACE authors seem to be suggesting that your diagnosis makes you incapable of making reasoned and civil arguments, especially since their COI demand comes immediately after accusing you of "unsubstantiated ... ad hominem attacks". Their use of the word "attacks" is especially egregious, with the connotations of violence, aggression, and militancy.
 

user9876

Senior Member
Messages
4,556
Quite so, @alex3619. Whether or not you think this particular statement of the editorial is supported by enough evidence, that's not really the point. The PACE authors have made claims that are way more sweeping and unsubstantiated than this, and never thought fit to correct them.

They backed an editorial in the lancet claiming a 30-40% recovery rate based on strict criteria although there was no evidence to back this up.
 

Cheshire

Senior Member
Messages
1,129
Conflict of Interest:
a situation in which someone cannot make a fair decision because they will be affected by the result
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/a-conflict-of-interest

I can't find any argument why a person suffering from a disease would be unable to make a fair decision because of that disease.
On the other hand, I can see plenty of reasons why people who have built up their career on a specific theory of the disease would fight tooth and nail to prevent any criticism of that theory.
 

sarah darwins

Senior Member
Messages
2,508
Location
Cornwall, UK
Not me, the ladies from the Blue Ribbon voting thread a while back had the passion for him, I just don't dare disappoint them now.. ;)

I got a bit smitten with Kiefer Sutherland watching his country music set at Glastonbury on Sunday. Actually, not so much the set, which was kinda terrible, but his interviews afterwards. One of the good guys.


(sorry for derailing this thread but sometimes it's good to be reminded that there are nice guys out there.
 
Last edited:

TiredSam

The wise nematode hibernates
Messages
2,677
Location
Germany
A conflict of interest is something that causes someone to biased in a manner which risks undercutting the science in favor of something else – such as profit, career, or reputation.
Well there we have it. @Keith Geraghty is trying to enhance his reputation by posing as someone who is entitled to have his work taken seriously, whilst concealing the fact that he is an M.E. sufferer. His attempt to establish a reputation that he is clearly not entitled to by reason of his illness creates a real risk of bias, undercutting the science, and a conflict of interest which should be declared. Otherwise how are readers supposed to know who's right - the PACE authors or Keith Geraghty? They might actually have to do some reading and thinking, which is the last thing we want.
 

Sean

Senior Member
Messages
7,378
...and own a cat.
Therefore you are a witch. :nervous:

Instead, the PACE authors seem to be suggesting that your diagnosis makes you incapable of making reasoned and civil arguments, especially since their COI demand comes immediately after accusing you of "unsubstantiated ... ad hominem attacks". Their use of the word "attacks" is especially egregious, with the connotations of violence, aggression, and militancy.
Yep. This is what propaganda looks like, and the BPS school are ruthless masters of that dark art.
 
Therefore you are a witch. :nervous:
Well, I do look like one.
witch.jpg
 

PDXhausted

Senior Member
Messages
258
Location
NW US
@Valentijn could the pace authors calling his department repeatedly be considered harassment?

Also it almost seems like it's bordering on discrimination to try and undermine the credibility of a person's publication based on whether they have an illness by forcing them to declare it as a conflict..
 
Messages
15,786
@Valentijn could the pace authors calling his department repeatedly be considered harassment?
Probably not, since there were only two calls made a year or more apart. Mostly it just makes them despicable assholes who will go to any lengths to silence ME patients.

It's part of a pattern of behavior which should make them obviously unsuitable for their present jobs, however. They've been maligning ME patients to the media and other audiences for years, if not decades. It's a form of bigotry and hate speech, and it shouldn't be tolerated, much less rewarded with professorships and research funding.
 

msf

Senior Member
Messages
3,650
I got a bit smitten with Kiefer Sutherland watching his country music set at Glastonbury on Sunday. Actually, not so much the set, which was kinda terrible, but his interviews afterwards. One of the good guys.


(sorry for derailing this thread but sometimes it's good to be reminded that there are nice guys out there.

Dear Sarah,

Please do not tar all men with the same brush. Most men are, in fact, awful. It is disappointing to see people like yourself talk about good guys when the rest of us are trying our best to give men a terrible reputation.

Yours sincerely,

msf
 

sarah darwins

Senior Member
Messages
2,508
Location
Cornwall, UK
Dear Sarah,

Please do not tar all men with the same brush. Most men are, in fact, awful. It is disappointing to see people like yourself talk about good guys when the rest of us are trying our best to give men a terrible reputation.

Yours sincerely,

msf

:) even more disappointingly, I intended 'good guys' in the 'good human' sense — a righteous, gender-free appellation. But I'm quite happy to be regarded as a militant "who needs men?" radical feminist if it makes for a better thread.
 

Keith Geraghty

Senior Member
Messages
491
Oxford Professor of Primary Care and working GP - Trish Greenlagh had a fall and needed a hip replacement surgery. She reviewed the evidence and argued with her own doctors about the best treatment. She then made her experience a key part of many of her talks on 'Evidence-based Medicine' and she has written a number of books on EBM, recounting her own experience often. I would follow this woman's lead anyday v the PACE trial authors.

Watch her talk she mentions herself from 8 mins on :

Homepage: https://www.phc.ox.ac.uk/team/trish-greenhalgh

Her twitter photo t-shirt says "I am more than my omics"

https://twitter.com/trishgreenhalgh?ref_src=twsrc^google|twcamp^serp|twgr^author
 
Last edited:

alex3619

Senior Member
Messages
13,810
Location
Logan, Queensland, Australia
Is being a critic a conflict of interest?

Sound reason and evidence are the lifeblood of science, and criticism based on both of these is a dire necessity. Is it time for me to resurrect the notion of Zombie Science again? These are ideas that walk amongst us, kept alive by dark arts (politics and money) rather than reasoned science based on sound evidence.
 
Messages
13,774
Appalling from PACE.

Massive respect to Keith for calmly standing up against this stuff.

And to David Marks, who it seems has been willing to put up with a lot of pressure to allow for the debate about the merits of PACE to take place in an academic journal. We should all be very grateful for their efforts.
 
Messages
60
Isn't this the kind of thing that is the basis for the claim that patients have an organized group indulging in vexatious behaviour toward the PACE authors? To clarify, are they not doing what they complain patients are doing? Making vexatious complaints?


I don't usually go in for psychobabble but this seems pertinent:

Psychological projection is a theory in psychology in which humans defend themselves against their own unconscious impulses or qualities (both positive and negative) by denying their existence in themselves while attributing them to others.[1]For example, a person who is habitually rude may constantly accuse other people of being rude. It incorporates blame shifting.


As well as the "vexatious complaints", one might consider accusations of "abuse", harassment, undeclared conflicts of interest, "false beliefs", "anti-science" etc.