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Gravity-induced exercise intervention in an individual with CFS/ME and POTS, 2019, Ballantine, Srassheim, Newton

Discussion in 'ME/CFS research news' started by MeSci, Jun 11, 2019.

  1. DokaGirl

    DokaGirl Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Gravity sucks.
     
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  2. Wonko

    Wonko Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    I am against it.

    If it wasn't for gravity we not only wouldn't have unemployment we also wouldn't have war, taxes, kale, global warming, poverty or malaria carriers like mosquitos.
     
  3. rvallee

    rvallee Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Not with that attitude.

    At least they didn't try antimatter therapy. That would have been explosive.
     
  4. rvallee

    rvallee Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Gravity is a well-known cause of misery. It is known.
     
  5. Sean

    Sean Moderator Staff Member

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    Obviously we are suffering from gravity-phobia.
     
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  6. Hutan

    Hutan Moderator Staff Member

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    From Figure 6: Weekly activity log at baseline, and at the conclusion of the intervention

    Hours active: 41, increased to 46
    Hours asleep: 55, decreased to 46. (average # of hours of sleep per day 7.9 hours, declined to 6.6 hours)
    Hours sedentary (eg lying on sofa): 72, increased to 76

    The paper noted:
    Yeah. And she has learned to 'decrease the impact of gravity' :) when carrying out active tasks (eg use a perching stool when hanging out washing). So it sounds as though the active tasks became more sedentary.

    Now, I'm probably giving this paper more analysis than a study of one person who may or may not have ME/CFS with an intervention of one hour of exercise a month warrants. But, if I had to make a conclusion, it looks like the person has managed to achieve a small increase in the number of active hours by increasing the amount of time she rests and by making the active hours less active. And this has resulted in sleep that is now less than the accepted optimum length and is more fragmented.

    The authors note that this patient was extremely well supported as she lived at home with her parents.
    whatever supercompensation may be. It sounds rather like she collapsed in a heap after the monthly 1 hour of exercise. That suggests that if the activity log had been done in the week following the exercise class, the number of active hours would have decreased from the baseline significantly.

    Hmm, so really not replicable then. But, if it didn't work, it wasn't the program's fault.
     
  7. Hutan

    Hutan Moderator Staff Member

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    Sounds as though this anti-gravity intervention that induces supercompensation must be something quite extraordinary, perhaps even novel then?

    From the paper:
    Screen Shot 2019-06-12 at 3.19.07 PM.png

    Given that the patient was not expected to do any exercises at home and given the supercompensation, the program sounds suspiciously like, no, surely it couldn't be?, but really, it does sound a lot like a 'push-crash cycle'.:eek:
     
  8. Forbin

    Forbin Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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  9. Hutan

    Hutan Moderator Staff Member

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    Thanks Forbin. There are so many issues with that dissertation, it feels cruel to dissect it. There is no evidence that the intervention is worthwhile. And yet the conclusion is that, if only they could identify the right sort of patient with the right sort of behavioural stability, the intervention would work.
     
  10. Daisybell

    Daisybell Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    That’s a bit like the saying about hospitals - that they would run perfectly if there weren’t any patients....
     
  11. Forbin

    Forbin Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    It seems as though the idea is that the autonomic response to changes in position can become deconditioned due to its disuse in people who stay off their feet (or experience extended weightlessness). The exercises seem intended to challenge the ANS with uncommon situations, as when the head is lower than the heart such that the blood leaving the brain must be pumped upward against the force of gravity. I'm guessing that challenges like this are intended to make the overall autonomic response to positional change more robust, thus ameliorating POTS symptoms when standing.

    The idea that the nervous system's autonomic response itself can become decondtioned might not be the same thing as saying that the muscle fibers that implement that response have become deconditioned.



    Of course, you have to take into account that everything I know about gravity I learned from Sandra Bullock.
     
  12. Tilly

    Tilly Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    I think they have to explain how that is achieved the journey from bed to a journey to where the classes are held. What they mean by bedbound and why they were bedbound.

    This does explain PEM and that is a big mistake (as always), why and how PEM exists before they try and treat someone with CFS/ME as they call it is advisable?

    Why is explaining PEM important because the delay of onset of symptoms is not the beginning of PEM. The two day elation some patients find when they have done an activity including cognitive needs to be expressed as "Boom and Bust" is not a good enough understanding. So if participant had read the newspaper and then done the exercises that would be different to just doing the exercises and not thinking for the next 4-5 days.

    PEM has little to do with symptoms and everything to do with the changes that goes on when you call for energy and that means thinking or digesting food. They are not taking life into consideration either. The more you do the more you need a shower.

    Talking about a baseline also shows they understand nothing about PEM so no understanding of ME as for CFS well anyone can be put under that banner.

    In my experience doing more does not mean living better as Emma Shorter explains

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyihXLvz1hY




    So there must be a measure of feet on the floor in an upright position hours counted symptom free to make sure life is getting easier and sustainable.
     
  13. Tilly

    Tilly Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    For all those that ask about anti gravity exercising means these are the swings that you exercise on

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-F6_WVyBxQ




    I am not going to say another word and this is an anti-gravity treadmill upload_2019-6-12_7-57-37.png
     
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  14. Sid

    Sid Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Another thing I thought was weird is that baseline measurements of heart rate were taken in 2013 and then there's a big gap until 2016 when improvement is noted. My POTS has also improved significantly in that time period with no gravity exercise intervention at all.
     
  15. TiredSam

    TiredSam Committee Member

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    upload_2019-6-12_9-49-2.png

    I hope they've remembered to patent exercise 5 of their novel intervention. It would be a travesty if someone else got in there first and made a fortune from it.
     
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  16. Hutan

    Hutan Moderator Staff Member

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    It's a nice idea @Forbin and sounds plausible. And I am certainly not arguing against activity of any sort for those who can do it.

    But there's no evidence that this particular intervention worked in anyone. And really, at 1 hour per month, that's not very surprising.

    Screen Shot 2019-06-12 at 7.29.50 PM.png

    Patient 1 - the star of the case study, and Patient 6 were the only two who reportedly managed to increase their weekly active hours over the 5 months. But Patient 6 didn't even have any data on the number of repetitions completed at the final session. The final session (Month 5) is shown in dark blue in the chart above. Check it out for each patient. Look at how the number of reps at the final session compares with the earlier sessions.

    Screen Shot 2019-06-12 at 7.34.03 PM.png

    Or another analysis - look at how the participants assess overall health. See how the author is suggesting that Patient 4 had the biggest improvement in total score 'from their first month to the conclusion of the study'. But they didn't even turn up for the last session and, with no Month 1 data, it's hardly a progression. And given they attended the fewest number of sessions out of all the participants, it's hardly a ringing endorsement of the intervention.

    Like I said, it's just too easy. It's an example of people finding exactly what they want to find in data. The real issue is what Julia Newton made of all this and why she felt able to put her name on the case study.
     
  17. feeb

    feeb Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    I've been laughing my head off since yesterday at that CRESTA Fatigue Clinic anti-gravity document. I know its not funny because this kind of nonsense could be causing real harm to the luckless sods who end up being treated at that clinic (and it does look like it did cause problems for the poor woman in the intervention in the paper). And they're sending students out into the world believing that lying down or standing up from a sitting position changes the way that spacetime curves around objects, which is a bit frightening.

    But it's still pretty funny.
     
  18. Trish

    Trish Moderator Staff Member

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    It seems to be a booklet for 'fatigue'. I decided to take a look. Big mistake. Couldn't get past this patronising rubbish in the introduction, clearly written by someone who has never faced life changing serious chronic disabling illness:

    I give up.

    Edit: I couldn't resist reading a bit more. It gets worse. Looks like it's written for very stupid women who are trying too hard to be perfect housewives and need a bit of help to slow down for a bit.

    aaaaargh.
     
  19. feeb

    feeb Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Wait til you get to the photo of the astronauts.
     
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  20. chrisb

    chrisb Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Yep. It only seems to mention fatigue, but it mentions all the catch words needed to associate it with CFS. I can see that there may be people unable to manage their own fatigue who might possibly be helped by this. It has no relevance to CFS and less to ME, but it is clearly intended to cater for them.
     
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