Advice from 'experts' on post-viral fatigue following Covid-19 (NHS Oxford Health, Science Media Centre, ...)

Andy

Andy

Senior Member (Voting rights)
Not a recommendation.
Introduction

This leaflet is one of a series about Coronavirus and mental health. The leaflets contain information about how the Coronavirus outbreak might affect your mental health, how to look after yourself, what to do if a problem persists, and where to find further information.

Coronavirus key facts:

• This is a widespread outbreak, not limited to one area

• It can occur at any time rather than being concentrated in wintertime

• For some people who are older and have pre-existing physical health conditions It is likely to be more severe, and may even be fatal, whereas for others it may be a relatively mild condition.

Whilst all of us are familiar with challenges in life, the Coronavirus outbreak and its consequences is a particularly difficult and stressful experience for everyone. Some people may have to cope with being unwell, looking after family members or dealing with loss and bereavement. Coming to terms with the consequences that the Coronavirus has had for you and those close to you can take some time. This leaflet focuses on coping with feeling extreme fatigue; others cover bereavement, depression and coping with worry and uncertainty
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Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Some people may go on to develop Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), sometimes also called Myalgic Encephalitis (ME), which is a condition which affects people in different ways. The main symptom is persistent fatigue (tiredness) and exhaustion which can be severe and disabling. The symptoms can also include:

• Malaise – feeling unwell or ‘out of sorts’, especially after exercise

• Sleep problems

• Headaches

• Muscle pains

• Swollen glands

• Difficulties with concentration and memory
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Who is likely to be affected?

Anyone can be affected by CFS, but there may be common themes for those with persistent problems. We know that there are both helpful and unhelpful ways to manage symptoms following a virus:

• Resting too much, for example spending most of the day in bed or doing very little, will lead to loss of fitness and muscle strength. When you then try to resume normal activities, you may find that you cannot do as much as you expect to do, and then rest more, causing further loss of fitness in a vicious cycle.

• Sleeping for hours during the day can lead to general malaise and problems sleeping at night. This in turn leads to more daytime fatigue and more resting, which in turn leads to more problems sleeping at night.

• Not allowing yourself time to recuperate and get better, such as going back to work too soon or resuming normal activities before you are fully well. People who have very high standards, like to do things well and do not like to let other people down, can push themselves very hard and do not allow themselves time to rest.
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https://www.oxfordhealth.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/OH-011.20-Coronavirus-and-fatigue-v2.pdf

Copy of document attached.
 

Attachments

Don't know why they don't just come straight out with it - in their eyes, if you don't recover fully and promptly it's something you have or have not done. They reserve the right to change which action is positive or negative depending on the patient involved and, possibly, wind direction.

There's a lot of fresh fodder in the offing .....

Edit - spelling
 
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Attachments

Trial By Error: Oxford-NHS Recommends GET/CBT for Post-COVID "CFS" Patients

The Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust–the agency that oversees NHS services in the Oxford area–recently posted a guide about coronavirus and fatigue that recommends, yes, graded exercise and cognitive behavior therapy. This pamphlet reads as if it emerged from a time warp. It’s the Rip van Winkle approach to health care–this crap could have been written 20 years ago. The pamphlet provides no indication that the author or authors are aware that the advice being dispensed has been contested fiercely in recent years–and that the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence is currently revising its outdated guidance for the illness.

ETA:
I plan to ask the Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust for references for the (mis)information provided in the pamphlet. I will also ask about the role of the agency’s “psychosocial support group.”


 
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It would be interesting to see if this pamphlet is in any way different to the 1995 Surawy paper - the one in which Sharp and Hawton almost managed to pass incognito by masquerading as Al. Perhaps another day.

As Sharp did describe himself at one stage as a clinical tutor, it must be said in his favour that he must have been an excellent teacher. It seems that there is a whole generation able to effortlessly regurgitate his opinions. Its just a shame about the opinions.

EDIT I have corrected an error caused bt a brain malfunction. I originally named Stone instead of Hawton. Apologies all round.
 
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It's odd. At the bottom of the leaflet is:

upload_2020-4-17_12-9-49.png

Yet if you go to their stated website, and do a search for "Psychosocial Response Group" (quotes needed else get hits with any one or more of the words in), then there are no hits, as if they are off the OHFT radar. If a medical unit is named as responsible for putting together a public health information leaflet, then for that unit to not be traceable or identifiable seems quite sinister. Where is the accountability?

As a sanity check I did do a search for "Psychosocial Response", and that does show one hit, proving that their search engine does treat quoted phrases correctly.
 
chrisb said:
As Sharp did describe himself at one stage as a clinical tutor, it must be said in his favour that he must have been an excellent teacher. It seems that there is a whole generation able to effortlessly regurgitate his opinions.
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That is one of the key problems: he is highly competent at brainwashing others into believing his opinions. If you understand psychology then you understand how to manipulate, and then it's simply down to whether you have the integrity to use such skills wisely or not.
 
Wow. This pamphlet contains the best medical advice since Huckleberry Finn explained to Tom Sawyer how to cure warts.
“Why, you take your [dead] cat and go and get in the grave-yard ’long about midnight when somebody that was wicked has been buried; and when it’s midnight a devil will come, or maybe two or three, but you can’t see ’em, you can only hear something like the wind, or maybe hear ’em talk; and when they’re taking that feller away, you heave your cat after ’em and say, ‘Devil follow corpse, cat follow devil, warts follow cat, I’m done with ye!’ That’ll fetch any wart.”
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Doing a search for "NHS psychosocial response group" and I found that it's a series of similar rather generic pamphlets. Frankly looks more like busywork so they can pretend to do something in a situation where this unit simply has no useful contribution.

https://www.oxfordhealth.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/OH-012.20-Coronavirus-and-worry-v2.pdf
https://www.oxfordhealth.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/OH-013.20-Coronavirus-and-Trauma-v2.pdf
https://www.oxfordhealth.nhs.uk/wp-...3/OH-010.20-Coronavirus-and-depression-v3.pdf

I don't think this unit knows anything about us and is just randomly producing stuff from the psychosocial trash pile, as otherwise it would actually be preferable to just reassign everyone to useful work. Though technically this unit knows about just as much about ME as the BPS brigade so whatever it's all the same in the end.

But it's notable that this is the stuff the NHS uses operationally. They clearly don't even pay attention to the NICE guidelines, the NHS uses the worst of FINE/PACE/FITNET/MUS nonsense, the one where "there is no disease, you can aim for full recovery". And this is the public work product, I'm sure the internal confidential resources are way worse than this.
 
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