Trial By Error, by David Tuller
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Kaiser Permanente Changes Course
Over the years, I’ve slammed U.S. medical and health care institutions that have championed the GET/CBT treatment paradigm for the illness or cluster of illnesses variously known as ME, CFS, ME/CFS or CFS/ME. I have done this both before and after the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention removed its own recommendations for the…
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Stupid Studies
Boy, it’s hard to keep up with all the stupid studies coming out! But that’s no reason not to take a look at a couple of them. (In both cases, I’m just making a few comments. Much more could be said about each of these studies. You can read more about them on the Science…
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Who Has the School Study Documents?
Update (later on March 4): Because Royal United Hospitals Bath suggested that I “redirect” my request for documents back to Bristol University, that’s what I did. Earlier today, I sent an e-mail to Bristol’s director of legal services. Here’s what I wrote: As you likely remember, I have raised concerns about a number of studies…
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The Cost of MUS
In January, I wrote about the problematic online training course developed by the Royal College of General Practitioners and touted by Steve Brine MP as addressing the “misconceptions” about ME (or CFS/ME, as the online course calls the illness). The lead author of the course was Carolyn Chew-Graham, a professor of general practice research at…
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Cochrane Update, and Caroline Struthers’ Latest Letter
The situation at Cochrane appears to remain fluid. Last week, the organization posted a notice that it is seeking a new editor-in-chief. The current occupant of the position, Dr David Tovey, is leaving in May. Dr Tovey has been at Cochrane for a decade, so this move could easily have been a long-planned departure. Since…
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Letters to Fiona Godlee and Nigel Hawkes
This morning, I sent the following message to Dr Fiona Godlee, editor-in-chief of The BMJ and editorial director of BMJ. The subject heading: “My remaining concerns…” Dear Fiona— Thank you for the quick changes to Nigel Hawkes’ BMJ news story about the UK Heath Research Authority’s letter on the PACE trial. I appreciate the addition…
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Professor Sharpe’s Retraction Requests
After this month’s release of the Health Research Authority’s PACE analysis, Professor Michael Sharpe sent e-mails to at least two US publications requesting a retraction or major correction of critical articles. Professor Sharpe’s e-mails accused the writers involved of suggesting that PACE was “fraudulent.” This accusation was not true. In both cases, the writers had…
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Spotila’s Take on NIH Grant Reviewers
Because of various developments in the UK and elsewhere, I’ve neglected goings-on back home. I’m working on a couple of things now but in the meantime I decided to post something typically insightful that Jennie Spotila published last week on her blog, Occupy M.E. It’s a frustration with this project that I don’t have the…
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Re-visiting My Questions for PACE Professors
I thought it might be helpful to re-post a list of questions I wanted to ask Professor White and his PACE colleagues in September, 2015–more than a month before Virology Blog posted the first installment of “Trial By Error: The Troubling Case of the PACE Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Study.” I originally posted this list on…
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BMJ Amends Last Week’s PACE Article
Added Feb 12: I realized today that I wanted to add a couple of details. The new version of the BMJ article about the Health Research Authority analysis of PACE includes this sentence at the bottom: “Correction notice: On 8 February 2019 a new version of this article was posted with clarifications added.” For unexplained…
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HRA Report Does Not Vindicate PACE
Last week, I reported that Bristol University had launched an independent investigation of research led by Professor Esther Crawley, at the request of the UK’s Health Research Authority. Today, the HRA released a report on the PACE trial that has portrayed it as a well-conducted study. GET/CBT supporters are framing this report as a vindication.…
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And Another Prebuttal…
Update: Since posting this several hours ago, I have learned that the story I’ve been “prebutting” is not in fact likely to appear imminently; I suppose that means it could be weeks before publication. I’m not sure whether I misinterpreted the reporter’s statement that obtaining my response to the “harassment” claims was the final outstanding…