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Hypocarbia or hypocapnia is a decrease in alveolar and blood carbon dioxide (CO2) levels below the normal reference range of 35 mmHg.

Dementia arises from a number of different conditions and causes not all of which are irreversible and some of which are better understood than others. Presumably it would be helpful to know if the 20% reduction related to any specific form of dementia. The article says: which I did not...

Was it in a tweet or in comment somewhere by one of the authors? I thought I had seen it somewhere. However I am not on Twitter, so if it was a tweet I could only have seen it shared here.

It is possible given this is a self selected sample that it underrepresents people who are improving or recovered, as it is possible that people more optimistic about their long term prognosis may be less likely to be picked up by the study or less likely to see a need to respond, however it...

I suspect we lack reliable data on this, as if I am anything to go on, when I was investigated over the last thirty years of my ME would give very different answers to the question of the overall course of my condition. In the first five or so years of my ME I generally improved over time, over...

As always @dave30th, a useful and clear account. These are issues that were research methodology 101 when I was an undergraduate some forty five years ago, how do the BPS advocates just not get the problems with subjective outcomes used in unblinded trials, when I suspect they would never...

I agree with @Trish, this is an important issue. For many people, if not most, any feeling better will be absorbed by daily living things that we were not able to do. This will be particularly so for anyone who is moderate or severe. It may be that for people who are mild, bearing in mind that...

When I was still working in the early stages of my ME I used to regularly get migraines at weekends. At the time I assumed it was part of what I now understand as PEM, though I did not have a label for it at that time. However this pattern was more marked when I started working part time (Tue...

I would add another point, which is psychiatry and clinical psychology’s reliance on questionnaires to define a number of psychological/psychiatric conditions, but fail to recognise that many/most of these questionnaires confound psychological issues and physical ill health. This means much of...

In case it is not just me: fulminant = (of disease or symptom) severe and sudden in onset Coprophenomena = the involuntary use of words or gestures that society may deem unacceptable.

My heart now sinks whenever I see the phrase ‘evidence-based’. It seems increasingly to mean unevidenced preconceptions/biases.

Fatigue is a nonspecific symptom, like headaches or word finding difficulties: they are associated with lots of different conditions but in isolation they are not necessarily indicative of any particular individual condition. With headaches, generic medicines may work for some forms of headache...

It may be that apps will help some people structure their experience so they can learn quicker how to monitor their own pacing needs, but I agree with what others have said elsewhere here, that there are no definite rules of pacing, rather that each individual eventually must learn to interpret...

It used to work with lots of systems, and previously with some systems you could press ‘0’ and cut out the whole multiple choice nightmare, but in general they are cutting out options that allow people to actually speak to someone. Certainly the Future Pensions Service now just cuts people off...

Yes, I had hoped things would get better after the end of March, but there has been no improvement in getting through. Fortunately I want to talk to them about contributions after 2016 so I have more time, but it is still very frustrating.

They definitely don’t make it clear here in advance that this section contains two separate pathways, one for people to fill in the form relating to themselves or one relating to people completing it for someone else. I ended up using the ‘other’ sections to add comments to clarify what I saw...

I hope it works better than the Inland Revenue Future Pensions service, I have been trying to ring them since mid March. Now if their lines are ‘busy’ they disconnect your call. Have been ringing several times a week when my personal assistant is here and just been cut off after after going...

It does seem that this post hoc psychologising is used to explain radically diverse outcomes. An explanation that can be used to explain contradictory outcomes is not a meaningful explanation. I am reminded of a homeopath I saw (when I was at the trying anything and everything stage) who said if...

And yet another ‘hassle’. Are we looking at researcher initiated psychological Munchausen’s by proxy?

A significant uplift for me is researchers actually taking ME serious and investing in meaningful biomedical research aiming at improving the quality of life for people with ME and a regular hassle is the endless psychological research, often misnamed BPS, that was never going to produce...