Dr Mark Vink's critique of PACE

Seanko

Well-Known Member
You may recall @Cort wote a piece on Dr Mark Vink a physician on Holland with ME/CFS who was conducting his his own research on ME/CFS.

He has written a new paper on the problems with the British PACE trial and its of of CBT/GET as treatments for the illness. He compares the PACE trial with a survey done by the ME Association (MEA). The failure rates quoted refer to the MEA study.

The PACE Trial Invalidates the Use of Cognitive Behavioral and Graded Exercise Therapy in Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/ Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: A Review

Journal of Neurology & Neurobiology
Mark Vink* Family Physician, Soerabaja Research Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
*Corresponding author: Vink, Family Physician, Soerabaja Research Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, E-mail: markvink.md@outlook.com

Abstract

The main findings reported in the PACE trial were that cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and graded exercise therapy (GET) were moderately effective treatments for Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS), and fear avoidance beliefs constituted the strongest mediator of both therapies.

These findings have been challenged by patients and, more recently, a number of top scientists, after public health expert Tuller, highlighted methodological problems in the trial.

As a doctor who has been bedridden with severe ME for a long period, I analyzed the PACE trial and its follow-up articles from the perspectives of a doctor and a patient.

During the PACE trial the eligibility criteria, both subjective primary outcomes, and most of the recovery criteria were altered, creating an overlap of the eligibility and recovery criteria; consequently, 13% of patients were considered “recovered,” with respect to 1 or 2 primary outcomes, as soon as they entered the trial. In addition, 46% of patients reported an increase in ME/CFS symptoms, 31% reported musculoskeletal and 19% reported neurological adverse events.

Therefore the proportion negatively affected by CBT and GET would be between 46% and 96%, most likely estimated at 74%, as shown in a large survey recently conducted by the ME Association.

Medication with such high rates of adverse events would be withdrawn with immediate effect. There was no difference in long-term outcomes between adaptive pacing therapy, CBT, GET and specialist medical care, and none of them were effective, invalidating the biopsychosocial model and use of CBT and GET for ME/CFS. The discovery that an increase in exercise tolerance did not lead to an increase in fitness means that an underlying physical problem prevented this; validates that ME/CFS is a physical disease and that none of the treatments studied addressed this issue.
 
Last edited:

Get Our Free ME/CFS and FM Blog!



Forum Tips

Support Our Work

DO IT MONTHLY

HEALTH RISING IS NOT A 501 (c) 3 NON-PROFIT

Shopping on Amazon.com For HR

Latest Resources

Top