Government funding for research centers and a data management center for ME/CFS has been made public, and the amount of funding allocated is infuriatingly small. The National Institute of Health (NIH) plans to issue two Requests for Application (RFAs) in January to fund 2-3 collaborative research centers and a data management center for ME/CFS. The
Chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) and fibromyalgia (FM) have a long, long way to go before they get the attention and resources they deserve. It would take a heroic leap to quickly achieve what people with these diseases deserve and what the diseases themselves – given their economic costs / burdens they impose – should receive. So much needs to be done (funding, doctor education, drugs, other treatments) – and we’re coming from such a low place – that it seems almost impossible that it can be done in a reasonable amount of time. In fact, people do the impossible – make what seems at first to be inconceivable differences in one area or another – all the time. This blog is about a man who did that, and did so in a way that may directly help those with chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) and fibromyalgia.
Thank you for this opportunity to address the CFS Advisory Committee. I am writing to in response to the call for comments regarding how the US government might engage members of the ME/CFS community, especially patients and their lay supporters, in addressing and solving the clinical, research, educational, and public health challenges of this condition.
Yesterday, Mary Dimmock, Arthur Mirin and Leonard Jason published a hallmark study in disease burden in myalgic encephalomyelitis. Why is funding so low? Funding for ME/CFS is arguably the lowest per patient for any major disease in the United States, averaging to about $5 per patient per year. Compare this to multiple sclerosis, an illness
The Solve ME/CFS Initiative (SMCI) hosted a webinar December 15 in which Zaher Nahle, PhD, MPA, summarized research in which they are participating or supporting. Nahle is the Vice President for Research and Scientific Programs at SMCI. Nahle began by listing the problems associated with ME’s perception, funding, and research. “The mother lode of our
One of the frequent complaints of patients, researchers, and policymakers about ME research is that the findings are scattered, and the studies, small. One group will discover X is elevated in 20 ME patients, only to find that when the test is done on another 13 patients two years down the line, they don’t show
#MillionsMissing Holland has made its voice heard in the House of Representatives. House of Representatives member Linda Voortman has filed questions about ME based on the protest demands with Holland’s Minister of Health, Welfare and Sport, Edith Schippers. In the letter, Voortman asks the minister of health if she is willing to provide more
When a grant proposal is submitted, a panel of experts will examine it for merit before making a final decision. But what happens when those ‘experts’ deny the very existence of the disease they purport to study? Memorably, a recent grant proposal was submitted to Canada’s CIHR (Canadian Institutes of Health Research) to study ME/CFS,
#MEAction Network UK’s statement denouncing CBT as a form of treatment for ME has been published in the January edition of Positive Health Online today. The letter was sent in response to FITNET, a controversial study that purported children and young people with ME could be successfully treated through CBT conducted over the internet. Esther
Do people really recover as a result of CBT and graded exercise? Sadly not, says a new analysis of PACE People with ME/CFS dream of recovery — of getting their health and lives back. So the results published by the PACE trial, showing that 22% of participants recovered after just 12 months of CBT or
