Search results

That's the interesting one, isn't it. Utility and reliability of a test, and wider acceptance of it, are different things. It's notable how often clinicians working with contested diagnoses are accused of dubious inventions that in another context would be called scientific advances.

No, it can never be that. It's reasonable to explore whether there might be explanations for the behaviour, it's reasonable to offer advice, information, and encouragement, it's reasonable to ask whether the patient would like support or would prefer to revisit it at a different time. But if...

So in the motivational interview, the patient compassionately and empathetically helps the professional to explore, understand, and accept the problems that are holding them back from doing their job. Do they say what the pay rate is?

I guess it'd be a lot clearer if they weren't present in samples from a control group processed at the same time. Haven't the energy to read the article properly, so I'm not sure whether they did this.

I've been asked to do the HADS numerous times, and it's only just struck me that I've always based my responses on the assumption I had the energy to enjoy things (which I do for some of the time). But that might be because I recognised it as a depression scale, and I know depression's not...

I'm glad you got to try it, @Shadrach Loom, and I hope it hasn't floored you for too long. Scooters aren't great for pwME, are they. There's nothing to support your arms and you torso, or stop your legs from flopping about, so you burn through a lot of energy really quickly. I've used Trampers...

It'll be drive-thru CBT next.

I think the nearest I can get is believing that the experience of some symptoms might be influenced by psychological factors, but that's a very long way from a whole condition being psychosomatic in origin. Anyway, in a world where we know that parasites can chemically influence their host's...

Yep. And continued care (for everything, not just ME/CFS) being contingent on the patient's co-operation with said coercive approach.

The Peak District National Park also has Trampers at some of its cycle hire centres.

I don't think that's a safe assumption, and it's probably best avoided in debates. Until someone has studied it, we don't really know.

90 million people? That's a staggering number. Reduced cerebral blood flow doesn't sound like great news, either.

Nice touch. :laugh:

As usual I wasn't very clear. I meant they're unlikely to get the media to listen to their caterwauling again, but I'm also a bit more optimistic about reducing the potential for treatment harm (at least in the medium term). Long Covid has increase understanding of concepts like pacing and PEM...

"...which offers even fewer opportunities to put a good case than the current review form, because there's no group whose awards we'd like the chance to cut more than people over state pension age. If they have to abandon an appeal partway through due to ill-health or lack of support, or they...

Yes, and surely this has to be the final bleat of the expiring sheep. The story's only just relevant enough to warrant small items run online for a few hours, and not only is it full of holes, it's the only one he's got. It's unlikely he'll get it up on legs again.

I've been trapped in a never-ending circle of PEM with it for about the last 25 years, it drives me nuts. It only strikes me quite how unable I am to keep still when someone else comments on it, or if I stay in the caravan with my sis (where the sounds of moving about seem to be amplified...

I wish Stewart Lee (comedian) or Marina Hyde (political columnist), both regular Guardian contributors, had the inside track on this story. I'd pay good money to read one of their scathing, hilarious commentaries on this crew and its antics.

But for some people feeling better would mean less pain, which would obviously reduce their movement. They'd be able to sit and relax between doing things, instead of constantly being driven to move their legs and shift their sitting position, or get up and totter about for a couple of minutes'...

As for step counts: I've run into major accuracy issues with pedometers worn on both the wrist and the leg. My ankle-worn pedometer thought that fidgeting was walking. I'm constantly shifting my legs around due to pain, and I'd record dozens of steps when I hadn't even stood up. More recently...