By Mary Dimmock and Jennie Spotila This is a cross-post originally published in Jennie Spotila’s blog, Occupy ME. In response to requests by U.S. patient organizations and advocates, the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has issued an Addendum to its 2014 ME/CFS evidence review. This Addendum downgrades the conclusions on the effectiveness
A tribunal panel has ordered Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) to release anonymised data from the PACE trial to Mr. Alem Matthees, a patient who requested it. The ruling has important implications for CFS patients both in the UK and worldwide. The David-vs-Goliath outcome represents the first successful attempt to begin to counter the
Science writer Julie Rehmeyer presented a critique of the PACE trial to North America’s largest gathering of statisticians in Chicago earlier this week. Her talk was titled, “Bad Statistics, Bad Reporting, Bad Impact on Patients: The Story of the PACE trial”. Rehmeyer explained to the 200-strong audience some of the problems with the trial, including
Dr. David Tuller has provided an overview and update of his work criticizing the PACE trial in a podcast interview with Professor Vincent Racaniello on This Week in Virology (TWiV). Dr. Tuller, of University of California, Berkeley, published a series of damning critiques of the study on Professor Racaniello’s Virology Blog, starting with a lengthy article
Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) have revealed that they spent £250,000 on legal fees in the recent tribunal concerning the release of anonymised data from the PACE trial. Their statement was made in response to a query made under the Freedom of Information Act by Mr. John Peters. QMUL paid £160,000 to Mills &
Five professors of science and mathematics, including Professor Ron Davis of Stanford University, have written to PLoS One demanding the correction of an “inaccurate claim” central to a PACE trial paper on cost-effectiveness that was published in the journal in 2012. Referring to a series of articles by Dr. David Tuller criticizing the PACE trial,
Professor Vincent Racianello of Columbia University has said of the PACE trial controversy, “I think they are going to ignore, obfuscate, and give their usual responses until we are all dead. I don’t have hope that the PACE authors, or Lancet, will respond in any meaningful way until there is more of an outcry.” Racianello’s
The article Professor Stephen Holgate: UK has “dream team” for Grand Challenge has raised significant concerns in the patient community. As managing editor, I would like to take this opportunity to clear a few things up: 1) The article is not from Holgate, but from a longtime, British writer for #MEAction who has written over 30
Professor Chris Ferguson has called the PACE trial authors’ failure to release data from the trial one of “the most dramatic pieces of ‘bad news’ for academic psychology during 2015.” He made his remark in the May issue of the British Psychological Society’s official magazine, The Psychologist, which is read by the Society’s 50,000 members.
The Centre for Welfare Reform has published a 64-page report criticising the PACE trial and relating the study to the debate over welfare reform and cuts to disability benefits in the UK. The report’s author, George Faulkner, discusses how the biopsychosocial model has helped create a climate in Britain in which the sick are seen
