Year: 2019

My first exchange of views with the PACE authors involved the issue of case definition–the criteria used to identify the illness they  called chronic fatigue syndrome. This exchange took place courtesy of The New York Times, not long after The Lancet published the results of the PACE trial. In March, 2011, the Times ran a piece…

One of my goals next year is to write more about so-called “medically unexplained symptoms,” also known as MUS. The term MUS might be useful as a descriptive name for the large category of phenomena that lack a proven pathophysiological pathway. But in the medical literature, and in the minds of those who present themselves…

A new study in the Journal of Psychosomatic Research, posted December 16th, has reported that patients with chronic fatigue syndrome who experience major post-exertional malaise have a greater burden of psychological distress than those whose PEM is minimal or non-existent. Of course, this is not surprising. The sicker people are, with this or any illness,…

On Friday, STAT posted my opinion piece about BMJ and the Lightning Process paper–in particular, about BMJ’s decision not to retract the paper despite the multiple documented violations of core ethical and methodological principles of medical research. That anti-scientific decision is potentially harmful not only to children suffering from a stigmatizing illness but ultimately to…

Simon McGrath provides excellent accounts of research topics at his blog, ME/CFS Research Review. He is skilled at rendering complicated stuff into easy-to-understand prose. On December 10th, Simon posted this update of developments discussed by Stanford geneticist Ron Davis during a recent talk at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. In his talk,…

What’s going on at the Mayo Clinic? It has been more than two years since the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) removed cognitive behavior therapy and graded exercise therapy as treatments of choice for the illness it now calls ME/CFS. And Mayo still seems not to have noticed that anything has changed—unlike…

Earlier this week, Dr Fiona Godlee, editorial director of BMJ, e-mailed me in response to concerns expressed about the study of the Lightning Process published in Archives of Disease in Childhood, one of the journals under her purview. Those concerns were expressed in an open letter to her signed by 72 scientists, clinicians and other…

Last last month, I resent Dr Fiona Godlee a letter criticizing BMJ’s decision to republish the Lightning Process study with the same findings. The first iteration, in July, was signed by 55 scientists, clinicians and other experts. This version was signed by more than 70 experts and over 60 patient and advocacy organizations. After I…

Professor Jonathan Edwards posted this essay a while ago on the Science For ME forum. I only noticed it recently. Professor Edwards, a retired rheumatologist from University College London, has played a key role n the last few years as an advocate for patients as well as proper science. So I thought it would be…

In July, I sent Dr Fiona Godlee, editorial director of BMJ, a letter signed by 55 experts about her company’s perplexing decision to republish the originally reported–and unreliable–findings from the trial of the Lightning Process. She did not respond. This morning I sent the letter again, with more individual signatories along with dozens of patient…

Two weeks ago, I sent a letter to the University of Bristol in which I requested that it withdraw its complaints to Berkeley about my “actions and behaviour.” Not long afterwards, I was informed by my academic department that the Berkeley chancellor had received a note from Teresa Allen, the chief executive of the Health Research…

Last Tuesday, November 5th, I spoke in Newry, Northern Ireland, about that research study from Bristol University with a 3000-word “correction/clarification” now appended to it. The talk was called “The Lightning Process Trial: A Saga of Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Research–and Even Worse Editorial Decisions.” The name comes from a well-known kids’ book, “Alexander and…