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New article on psychosomatic theories on diabetes This blog post looks at psychosomatic theories of diabetes, from Walter Cannon’s concept of ‘emotional glycosuria’ to the myth of the diabetic personality. We will discuss the problems with the term ‘brittle diabetes’ and the importance of...

Moved from this thread: Swiss Re: Expert Forum on secondary COVID-19 impacts Feb 2021 I sometimes try to follow Sharpe's reasoning. Perhaps he meant that Monbiot shouldn't have highlighted that long covid might result in lifelong disability because that remains uncertain at this point and it...

Can't remember, but it was something like that, much lower than common estimates for ME/CFS.

If I recall correctly, the study identified cases based on GP's records so if the GP's didn't diagnose people with ME/CFS, patients would have been overlooked. So the 0.2% is likely a low estimate.

Interesting study. Unfortunate that the Japanese findings could not be confirmed.

If only they had interviewed a patient with severe ME/CFS who tried GET/CBT only to get worse afterwards. What a different episode it would have been.

In Belgium, the government plans to start vaccinating people younger than 65. Priority is given to a large group of people with health conditions like diabetes, heart disease, chronic kidney disease etc. This group consists of approximately 1,2-1,5 million people or 10% of the population in...

Cool, thanks for sharing. I like this version of John Prine's Angel from Montgomery the most.

Same here in this article from Science based medicine. It states: "Their recommendation for acupuncture benefits ≤3 months is based, by their own admission, mostly on very low quality evidence and some low quality evidence. What does this mean? Mostly that the trials are not properly controlled...

So the guideline recommends exercise, CBT, ACT, acupuncture, antidepressants etc. But it actively discourages the use of pain medication (NSAIDS, opoids, paracetamol).

I came across this article while researching the history of psychosomatic medicine. It looks interesting but unfortunately, I do not have access to it. Is anyone able to read it?

The Emotionally Disturbed Child as a Family Scapegoat Ezra F. Vogel and Norman W. Bell The phenomenon of scapegoating is as old as human society. Sir James Frazer records, in The Golden Bough,2 numerous instances, reaching back to antiquity, of public scapegoats, human and otherwise. He views...

I think we have seen previous studies from this Taiwanese database, although not in a prominent journal such as Scientific Reports. I think this study has the same issues that we previously noted in an American prevalence study that used ICD-codes: these probably don't select CFS as it is...

Abstract Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) has been defined as unexplained relapsing or persistent fatigue for at least 6 consecutive months. Immuno-inflammatory pathway, bacterial infection, and other causes play essential roles in CFS. Helicobacter pylori infection is one of the most common...

This looks interesting, thanks to Andy and Simon for highlighting it. Only 2.6% reported persistent fatigue at week 6.

There's also the CBT study by the Dutch group of Bleijenberg and Van Der Meer. The main results were published in The Lancet in 2001. As far as I know, the follow-up results have never been reported but I found two people who stated that during a conference Bleijenberg announced that there was...

So it seems that in all studies of GET and CBT the control catches up over time? FITNET, FINE, PACE CURE and now GETSET all seem to report no statistically significant difference at follow-up. One reason might be the reduction in sample size due to drop-outs. Another possible explanation is...

New blog post: the dark psychosomatic history of epilepsy. https://mecfsskeptic.com/the-dark-psychosomatic-history-of-epilepsy/

I thought this study of Wessely' was interesting, indicating that something might have happened during the Gulf War. Even though Wessely himself prefers to give a BPS explanation focused on anxiety, the data look interesting. Health of UK servicemen who served in Persian Gulf War - The Lancet...

What do you mean with the reference to Gulf War Syndrome? I thought Wessely'study was persuasive that something might have happened in the Gulf War that caused the symptoms of GWS.