Royds Withy King - The PACE trial – “one of the biggest medical scandals of the 21st century”

Royds Withy King - The PACE trial – “one of the biggest medical scandals of the 21st century”


Posted by James Millar Craig


https://www.roydswithyking.com/pace-trial-scandal-me-cfs/

 

This is the page for the author - https://www.roydswithyking.com/our-people/james-millar-craig/

 

Well well well that is interesting. A law firm specialising in medical negligence and insurance litigation, offering conditional fee arrangements. I wonder if they've handled a class-action claim before?

In my experience (which is limited I grant you, but I have been on the inside of a similar firm) lawyers write articles like that when they sniff a bit of business and are hoping to get some of it. Actually hoping to be the first to get some of it.

@Andy I wonder if we should make contact? They may be unaware of our existence as the premier site on the internet where science and the ME/CFS community meet. We could be the premier site on the internet where science, the ME/CFS community, and their lawyers meet.

 

Time for a new strapline?

 

Yeah, my thoughts as well. I'll stick it on my to-do list. I also spotted at least one typo in his article so I can let him know that at the same time.

 

I'm rather excited. The solicitors firm I worked for in London specialised in insurance litigation, but on the other side.

 

Seems to have his eye on the ball:

https://www.roydswithyking.com/miley-v-friends-life-typical-story-sufferer-insurer/

 

@Andy If you are contacting this law firm. Could you advise them that there is an error of fact in their statement. Nice has not yet removed GET from the guidelines.

Too crashed to send the sentence.


EDIT: under heading " what does this mean for the future?"

 

Also member of MEAssociation.

Bottom of page . Thanks @NelliePledge

 

Wow - this guy is really focused on ME/CFS! Some excerpts from his bio (excisions indicated by ellipses):

James Millar Craig
Partner...

James Millar Craig is a highly experienced lawyer who deals with personal injury, clinical negligence and insurance claims.


About James
A litigator with over 35 years of experience, James has been a partner at Royds and now Royds Withy King since 1983...

James has over 24 years’ experience in the specialist area of Permanent Health Insurance (PHI) and other insurance litigation. The claims he has handled involve a variety of illnesses, including in particular ME (myalgic encephalomyelitis) / CFS (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome) disputes...


Practice areas

• Claims for Permanent Health Insurance (PHI) and other insurance litigation involving a variety of illnesses, and ME / CFS disputes in particular. James is recognised as an expert in this field by ME Association and Action for ME. He has written on the subject and appeared in Parliament with ME Association...

Work highlights

• Successfully representing clients in health insurance claims: over the years claims have succeeded against insurers such as Unum, LV, Aviva, Canada Life, Zurich, Wesleyan and Abbey Life.....

Memberships
James is a member of the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL), ME Association, Action for ME and the RAC.​

 

In case he breaks down getting to court?

 

This is one of the companies that the MEA always recommend and they have adverts in the MEA magasine. There is another one that is an ME specialist as well . I rang both up last year and the other one was very underwhelming and not knowledgeable on a basic employment part of an insurance contract so I didn't go with them. I did follow up with this one as they were the more experienced.

James seems to be very knowledgeable about ME and has been involved on some parliamentary stuff (can't remember where but was a committee or a discussion thing). I have reservations though as well about general case handling - I am sure it is fine if you have a lot of money to get them to do everything. If you want any specifics I can chat separately. But overall they so seem to be the most experienced in terms of ME.

There is another legal firm though that handled the Miley v Friends Life case which went to the High Court. They are EMW Law LLP and I have handled the solicitor which worked on that case. He seemed really switched on and he said that at the time they had contacted the MEA and offered to do some work with them - I think it was in the form of writing some advice or an article. Apparently they didn't hear back. As they were keen to help the community they would also be a good team to contact as well as James Millar Craig from Royds.

If you would like to reach out then I can pass on a message or give you the contact details for both companies.

 

I saw 3:

1. Middle 'n' missing from 'Monaghan' so that it reads 'Moaghan' 3 lines above '
What does this mean for the future?'

2. 'Caroline Dinneage' instead of 'Dinenage' 3 lines further down.

3. I can't find the 3rd! Maybe it was the one referred to by Binkie4 as 'GET': "...has removed the recommendations to embark on harmful exercise." just before the misspelling of 'Dinenage'. (not a typo but an erroneous statement)

 

Thats actually a really good brief, succinct overview of the situation, and gratifying to think we can do a massive class action suit in the yrs to come.

But @TiredSam & @Andy...if someone does contact him, i think it'd also be a good idea to make him aware that the NICE guideline was not based on the PACE trial but was written 4yrs before PACE came out. The guideline (I know you know all this but just stating it for any less informed readers) was based on trials with the same issues & methodological flaws as PACE, & from the same researchers, but since this is involves the law, such a factual inaccuracy from the outset isnt good for credibility.

It's almost become urban myth among the slightly less informed ME community afaics, that NICE should remove CBT/GET because PACE is now discredited, but if that inaccuracy is allowed to perpetuate, it will be so much easier for them to wriggle out of changing the guideline. The point is that (afaiaa) ALL the so called 'science' done by these researchers since they started their careers - including the studies the guideline is based on - is unreliable & should be resigned to the trash bin. That unblinded trials with subjective outcome measures are an extremely poor excuse for science & should never have been taken seriously in the first place.

Sorry slight digression from the OP, but this firm & this excellent lawyer who seems to know his stuff & could be a great ally, needs to get his facts absolutely straight if any claims, either current or future are to be successful.
The BPSers brush away all criticism with ease it seems, and istm that they manage that sometimes because of minor factual inaccuracies on the part of our advocates. Our arguments need to be, as they say, 'whiter that white'.

 

But I guess it's fair to say the PACE trial strongly reinforced beliefs that NICE had got it right, whereas if the results had been reported honestly (i.e. evidence that the NICE guidelines were wrong), then those NICE guidelines might have been under much stronger pressure to change from 2011 on.

 

'A health scandal in our generation' is the subtitle to the book by former MP Ian Gibson and Elaine Sherriffs, published a year ago, 'Science, Politics, and ME....'



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