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

Not a recommendation.

https://www.oxfordhealth.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/OH-011.20-Coronavirus-and-fatigue-v2.pdf

Copy of document attached.

 

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

 

ARRRRRRGH

 

This would be a nice tweet at #MEawarenessHour

Maybe we schould take more attention in advocacy to debunk this nonsense about boom & bust and perfectionists. I think even many patients aren’t aware of this.

 

https://twitter.com/user/status/1250477841126432769

 

Very interesting article about recovery from COVID being very variable.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/13/opinion/coronavirus-recovery.html

 

I like this twitter thread by a ME patient or patient's mom
https://twitter.com/user/status/1250377451844272129

 

https://twitter.com/user/status/1250756172690403334

 

They are like a bl**dy virus themselves!

 

Version 2 https://www.oxfordhealth.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/OH-011.20-Coronavirus-and-fatigue-v2.pdf

Tom Kindlon found it and posted it on twitter

 

Copy of it attached for reference - it still looks as bad as the last one, just with a fancier front page.

 

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fiercely in recent years–and that the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence is currently revising its outdated guidance for the illness.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.”

 

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.

 

It's odd. At the bottom of the leaflet is:



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.

 

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.

 

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.