24 April Tuller - Trial By Error: Andrew Lloyd’s Past Endorsement of PACE

Esther12 · Apr 25, 2018

Tuller looks at some of the annoying and unjustified claims Andrew Lloyd has made about the PACE trial, and those pointing out problems with it.

http://www.virology.ws/2018/04/24/trial-by-error-andrew-lloyds-past-endorsement-of-pace/

Warning: probably not ideal reading before bed. It's got me feeling irritable again, and I already knew this stuff!

dave30th · Apr 25, 2018

Yes be careful. I don't want to be the cause of PEM in anyone!!

Andy · Apr 25, 2018

Preview

This post is sort of long and complicated, but I think the details are important given Andrew Lloyd’s outsized role in the ME/CFS domain in Australia. I urge patients to take care not to over-exert themselves in reading it!

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A few weeks ago, I interviewed Andrew Lloyd, an infectious disease specialist at the University of New South Wales. When I asked about his past referencing of the PACE trial as evidence for treating ME/CFS with CBT and GET, he told me he “might have” cited it in papers but couldn’t actually remember whether he had or not. He further declared himself “unfussed” about the controversy over the trial because other evidence (e.g. the Cochrane reviews) also found that these therapies were effective. (More on that problematic argument in another post.)

In my short blog about our conversation, I indicated that I found it hard to believe Professor Lloyd couldn’t remember whether or not he’d cited PACE. Here’s one reason: In 2015, he co-wrote a BMJ editorial that discussed three separate PACE papers. Here’s another: Three years before that, he co-authored a commentary in the Journal of Internal Medicine that not only mentioned the PACE findings favorably but unfairly criticized smart patients and researchers who had questioned the reported results.
Click to expand...

More at link in original post.

Trish · Apr 25, 2018

Excellent article, @dave30th. Thank you.

Sean · Apr 25, 2018

When assessing the Australian situation, don't let Prof. Ian Hickie off the hook. He has flown under the accountability radar very successfully, but his influence and culpability from the early 1990s on, both in Australia and internationally, are substantial.

For a start, he was a co-author on the Fukuda 1994 criteria, and is big on somatisation, including conjuring up a checklist to assess it, known as SPHERE (Somatic and Psychological HEalth REport).

I don't know for a fact, but I also strongly suspect that he had a major hand in the very controversial draft Australian clinical guidelines issued in 1997 (with the final version coming out in 2003). The draft was basically just the views of the UK branch of the BPS club. It was truly atrocious, and fired up patient anger here big time.

Nellie · Apr 25, 2018

Somewhere along my very brain foggy road I'd concluded that there must be two Andrew Lloyds working on ME but with very different views.

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24 April Tuller - Trial By Error: Andrew Lloyd’s Past Endorsement of PACE

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24 April Tuller - Trial By Error: Andrew Lloyd’s Past Endorsement of PACE

Esther12 Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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Andy Committee Member

Trish Moderator Staff Member

Sean Moderator Staff Member

Nellie Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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