Functional neurological disorders: effective teaching for health professionals (2020) Alexander Lehn et al. + online discussion with Sharpe.

[Esther12]

Functional neurological disorders: effective teaching for health professionals

1. Alexander Lehn1,2,
2. Dharsha Navaratnam3,
3. Megan Broughton4,
4. Vince Cheah5,
5. Alison Fenton3,
6. Karl Harm3,
7. Diana Owen6 and
8. Paul Pun7

Abstract
Objectives To provide an outline for the delivery of an educational course or lecture about functional neurological disorders (FND) that is directed towards health professionals with varying clinical knowledge and to highlight the educational efficacy that can be derived from a well-designed educational platform.

Method Through multidisciplinary collaboration, a course designed to develop the skills for diagnosis and management of FND was created. Elements essential to the delivery of education are: (A) knowledge creation; (B) facilitating multidisciplinary cross-pollination; (C) listening to patients’ experiences; (D) communication skills practice; (E) case studies; (F) discipline specific mentoring; (G) establishing and addressing participant learning goals and (H) developing collegial and referral networks. Changes in participants’ knowledge and clinical practice were assessed via anonymous questionnaires before and after the course.

Results Dramatically improved knowledge and confidence in assessment and management of people with FND has been found both immediately following the course as well as on 6-month follow-up.

Conclusion It is possible to make real change in the understanding and management of medical and allied health clinicians working with people with FND with a low-cost intervention. Also, the development of educational networks and multidisciplinary collaboration can lead to the creation of therapeutic platforms for the diagnosis, management and advocacy of this patient group.

https://neurologyopen.bmj.com/content/2/1/e000065

The related talk "Setting up an FND Teaching Curriculum" was held on zoom and is kept available here:

https://zoom.us/rec/play/v8B5c7ugqj...X-vYKyEi0V3cAMAelb7UQYbbKqX1EQ-CJhxBVBw81g4vz

You can listen at x1.5 speed.

The first part was only really interesting to see what weak work is being cited/praised and what it's claimed medical staff find most valuable: anecdotes. That seems to be a reoccurring theme, a lot of talk on the importance of starting with 'patient stories', case studies, etc. So often this seems like an excuse for researchers to promote a prejudice driven fiction.

Sharpe pops up from 36:30. More stuff I found uninteresting, while saying how revolutionary and exciting what they were doing was.

Around 49:00 there was a question that seemed to make some strong assertions on the harm of not taking their approach, considering how much is unknown.

1hr01:35 - Sharpe saying how important it is to empower patients to drive the agenda and make doctors change. I guess he means only the patients he likes?

 

[alktipping]

effective teaching of lazy medical professionals to reduce their workloads by dumping patients into this particular wastebin thus guaranteeing lucrative work for parasitic cretins .

 

[rvallee]

with a low-cost intervention

That's all it's ever been about. And like everything BPS/FND/MUS it's all fiction, it actually costs many times more in the end by the same effective process used by corrupt people everywhere: externalities, simply offloading the costs elsewhere, unseen. Like pollution or poison sent down a stream, the harm is far away and hidden from view. Only a few make bank while the whole of society pays far more in the end.

In the end the banality of evil almost always comes down to the same thing: money and power. This is no different here, there is nothing special about medicine that insulates the field from such fallacy. It sure is boom time for the banally evil.

 

[Barry]

Sharpe saying how important it is to empower patients to drive the agenda and make doctors change. I guess he means only the patients he likes?

Without falling into the trap of talking politics per se, we only have to look at high profile leaders to see the technique being used here. Say all the right words, so it sounds like you are on the side of the angels, but behave completely counter to that. The people they want to impress only hear the words, and are wilfully blind to what is actually done.