BPS attempts at psychologizing Long Covid

rvallee said:
Yup. It looks every bit as bad as it sounds. The whole IAPT-LTC program is a complete disaster and of course they want to expand it because the hammer does not distinguish between nails and other objects but once flattened out everything can look like a flattened nail if you want to.
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But will it be a big enough disaster ?
 
Amw66 said:
But will it be a big enough disaster ?
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Recent events have suggested that the human reaction to disasters, of varying kinds, is not exactly as good as one would hope. Basically, disaster has a rather high approval rating. So even if it continues to be disastrous... Thing is, one person's disaster is another person's knighthood/ladyhood and numerous professional awards and recognition.
 
There hasn't been much coverage on Long Covid in Norway. But one of the biggest papers, VG, has an article today. It's not yet available online, but here is a summary:

An emergency care doctor says that they've previously compared corona with flu, but that it might be more correct to compare it with mononucleosis, as patients often are sick for much longer.

The doctor caught the virus himself and was surprised of how long it took for him to return to normal. 9 months in he is still feeling ill and hopes to be able to return to work 50% after Christmas.

Clinic manager for physical medicine and rehabilitation at a hospital is also leading an expert group from the Norwegian Directorate of Health who will be advising health care workers caring for corona patients in the rehabilitation phase.

She says that they're seeing many with a mild corona infection having trouble with fatigue and concentration problems after the infection and that it takes time for them to get back to normal.

She says symptoms can be higher pulse, being tired, pain and mental symptoms.
- The body can be in a state of alert over time. These ailments are real, but in most cases they will pass.

She further says she's been worried that many deteriorate due to there being so much bad information about how dangerous corona is, both serious and unserious information.
- It can be information that creates fear and makes you anxious and afraid. This also does something to the body. It becomes an additional stress reaction, the level of alertness increases and the health follows.

She underlines that anxiety can increase physical symptoms, and that more information might prevent patients becoming more ill.

So it seems Norway is about to take a psychosomatic approach to Long Covid..

Poor patients.
 
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I missed my bin collection last night, I am definitely foggy headed and not with it, possibly a bit stressed and emotionally labile due to a constantly recurring cycle of inflammation subsequent to my covid infection this time last year, which is still giving me weekly migraines and exacerbating PEM considerably but it strikes me that if a virus makes you ill and stress while suffering from a virus makes you iller that you have to relax and not stress. So I am trying not to worry about my bins.

I completely accept stress does matter in recovery from viral illness. Stress makes things worse, reducing stress helps. It does not help to deny the counterproductive affect of stress on viral illness.

The problem is a history of clinicians losing their way in psycho-sophistry, imagining models of conditioning and reinforcement which are not accurate, misapplying a purely psychological paradigm, ignoring the inflammatory basis of the immune response to viral infections and doubling down on stressors as a treatment for MECFS in a misguided attempt to break patients out of an illness which is not primarily psychological, which consequently doesnt work and makes people iller, because stress makes viral illness worse, because these people have viral illness not a psychological condition. Is that clear enough ?

The problem is not patients behaving badly, the problem is, like David Tuller was saying in a recent blog, clinicians adopting the wrong paradigm which doesnt work and is harmful.

The question is, are these Norwegians really going to be mislead by people like Vogt and do this all over again or can we communicate with them and intercede? It is possible there are still people out there trying to avoid paying for treatments, which encourages this kind of mistake. Is that a factor this time?

I think we should monitor and if necessary intervene and by we I especially mean recognised groups like ME Association, Action for ME and ME Action and any other ME organisations out there.

IMHO we do have to be vigilant and responsive where necessary, like the T cells of the human psyche, remembering past pathology and seeking out and deactivating pathogenic ideas where they recur.

We just need to relax while we are doing it and not get stressed or anything. :hug:
 
Kalliope said:
There hasn't been much coverage on Long Covid in Norway. But one of the biggest papers, VG, has an article today. It's not yet available online, but here is a summary:

An emergency care doctor says that they've previously compared corona with flu, but that it might be more correct to compare it with mononucleosis, as patients often are sick for much longer.

The doctor caught the virus himself and was surprised of how long it took for him to return to normal. 9 months in he is still feeling ill and hopes to be able to return to work 50% after Christmas.

Clinic manager for physical medicine and rehabilitation at a hospital is also leading an expert group from the Norwegian Directorate of Health who will be advising health care workers caring for corona patients in the rehabilitation phase.

She says that they're seeing many with a mild corona infection having trouble with fatigue and concentration problems after the infection and that it takes time for them to get back to normal.

She says symptoms can be higher pulse, being tired, pain and mental symptoms.
- The body can be in a state of alert over time. These ailments are real, but in most cases they will pass.

She further says she's been worried that many deteriorate due to there being so much bad information about how dangerous corona is, both serious and unserious information.
- It can be information that creates fear and makes you anxious and afraid. This also does something to the body. It becomes an additional stress reaction, the level of alertness increases and the health follows.

She underlines that anxiety can increase physical symptoms, and that more information might prevent patients becoming more ill.

So it seems Norway is about to take a psychosomatic approach to Long Covid..

Poor patients.
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NRK had an article some weeks ago about the same thing. Including a doc (or physiotherapist, don't remember) saying that patients had become afraid to exert themselves since the disease started with them being breathless and exertion reminded them of this :banghead:
 
on the news this evening was a piece about a primary school in merseyside employing a wellness teacher going on about covid stress affecting primary school kids and causing somatic symptoms where will all this tripe lead us ? not to a better future that's for sure . denying that children can get physically ill for all kinds of reasons and replacing it with more of this ideology is breath taking .
 
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not a recommendation
piece in Psychology today
When the Body Speaks
Let's not neglect the physical symptoms of emotional distress during COVID-19.
Psychiatrists, for their part, have tried to lessen the stigma of psychogenic physical ailments by abandoning the words “conversion,” “psychogenic,” and “psychosomatic.” The DSM-5 includes the awkward mental illness category “somatic symptom disorder,” even though a patient who did a simple Google search would quickly learn that this is a fancy term for psychosomatic disorder. To further obfuscate the psychosomatic, a few years ago the American Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine even changed its name to the Academy for Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry, the branch of psychiatry concerned with the intersection of medical and psychiatric illness. They made this change precisely because of the stigma associated with the word “psychosomatic.”
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(note Michael Sharpe is current president of ACLP)
Doctors like primary care physicians and neurologists thus tread carefully when discussing the psychological aspects of physical suffering.
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Clinical research has shown that the most effective treatment for many chronic multi-symptom conditions, like chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis, is a combination of exercise, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), and psychotherapy, findings that infuriate many people with CFS/ME.[v]
Exercise is crucial because a lack of exercise exacerbates fatigue through deconditioning, and it can lead to a wide range of other medical problems. But doctors who recommend exercise or psychiatric treatment for CFS/ME, and some policymakers who fund psychiatric research on the condition, can come off as dismissive, as if they are telling the patient their physical illness isn’t real.
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https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/nobodys-normal/202012/when-the-body-speaks
 
Clinical research has shown that the most effective treatment for many chronic multi-symptom conditions, like chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis, is a combination of exercise, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), and psychotherapy, findings that infuriate many people with CFS/ME.
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People tend to do that when offered therapies that don't work and frequently cause harm, and then get fobbed off with endless bullshit excuses for it, and somehow cop the blame when they try to point all this out. :grumpy:

But doctors who recommend exercise or psychiatric treatment for CFS/ME, and some policymakers who fund psychiatric research on the condition, can come off as dismissive, as if they are telling the patient their physical illness isn’t real.
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Don't mind the sales pitch, feel the width! :woot:

Plus the usual misdirection about not claiming that the physical illness isn't real. :rolleyes:
 
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Long COVID: 'I thought being young and fit would protect me - I was wrong'
"A tight band crushing around my chest and restricting my breathing, drenching night sweats, muscle spasms, skin rashes, bulging blood vessels, slurred speech, difficulty swallowing, nerve pain, abdominal pain, weight loss, cognitive problems, confusion, phantom smells, tastes and sounds, numbness and tingling in my limbs. The list goes on.
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"I was terrified, but my GP, hospital doctors and consultants, kept insisting I was suffering from anxiety. When doctors couldn't explain my symptoms with a blood test or scan, they often denied I was sick at all or downplayed my symptoms.

"I felt like I was going mad. I cried when I finally found an online patient group and I realised I wasn't alone. We now know that one in 10 people who catch COVID-19 go on to suffer from Long COVID.

"I was shocked to learn this is known as medical gaslighting - when difficult-to-diagnose symptoms are dismissed as 'anxiety' or 'all in your head'
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https://news.sky.com/story/long-cov...p-at-more-than-60-clinics-in-england-12165947
 
Not so much 'BPS' trying to psychologize LongCovid, as much as, well, nonsense-psychology:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/nobodys-normal/202012/when-the-body-speaks

Psychiatrists, for their part, have tried to lessen the stigma of psychogenic physical ailments by abandoning the words “conversion,” “psychogenic,” and “psychosomatic.” The DSM-5 includes the awkward mental illness category “somatic symptom disorder,” even though a patient who did a simple Google search would quickly learn that this is a fancy term for psychosomatic disorder. To further obfuscate the psychosomatic, a few years ago the American Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine even changed its name to the Academy for Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry, the branch of psychiatry concerned with the intersection of medical and psychiatric illness. They made this change precisely because of the stigma associated with the word “psychosomatic.”
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Mhmm.

Clinical research has shown that the most effective treatment for many chronic multi-symptom conditions, like chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis, is a combination of exercise, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), and psychotherapy, findings that infuriate many people with CFS/ME.[v] Exercise is crucial because a lack of exercise exacerbates fatigue through deconditioning, and it can lead to a wide range of other medical problems. But doctors who recommend exercise or psychiatric treatment for CFS/ME, and some policymakers who fund psychiatric research on the condition, can come off as dismissive, as if they are telling the patient their physical illness isn’t real.
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Yes, the old myth that patients dislike CBT or GET because it is "dismissive" and "suggests that the illness isn't real". Nothing at all due to the low quality of evidence. Of course not.

Also funny how certain individuals always use the term "CFS/ME" in that order...
 
Snow Leopard said:
Not so much 'BPS' trying to psychologize LongCovid, as much as, well, nonsense-psychology:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/nobodys-normal/202012/when-the-body-speaks



Mhmm.



Yes, the old myth that patients dislike CBT or GET because it is "dismissive" and suggests that the illness isn't real. Nothing at all due to the low quality of evidence. Of course not.

Also funny how certain individuals always use the term "CFS/ME" in that order...
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The first sentence says the whole thing. That they think the issue is with the words, not their meaning. Again I can't tell the difference whether they think we're completely stupid or if they really are that delusional. Or maybe they think we can't read. I don't know really because they are quite open in their papers and conferences that they mean the exact same thing and that we actually can, as a matter of fact, read words and comprehend them.

Feels like old priests trying to keep alive a tradition of murder sacrifices by attempting to change the method of execution. As if that's the issue.
 
This has appeared on another thread. I noted there that the author appears to have received a PhD from Harvard in 1989 in anthropology. Kleinman would have been head of the department which I believe fell within the larger orbit of Eisenberg. It is notable that he does not, in the article, explain his expertise.

Don't ask for quotes from Kleinman on the subject. I could provide them.
 
chrisb said:
This has appeared on another thread. I noted there that the author appears to have received a PhD from Harvard in 1989 in anthropology. Kleinman would have been head of the department which I believe fell within the larger orbit of Eisenberg. It is notable that he does not, in the article, explain his expertise.
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The link is Roy Richard Grinker Sr, who wrote about psychosomatics in the 40s-60s.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_R._Grinker_Sr. (note, link isn't playing nice with . at the end)

Also, from a prior discussion on this forum (which discusses Grinker):
https://www.cambridge.org/core/jour...social-model/A31DAA3BED6569F6080A1DF2C1D15A64
 
Snow Leopard said:
The link is Roy Richard Grinker Sr, who wrote about psychosomatics in the 40s-60s.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_R._Grinker_Sr. (note, link isn't playing nice with . at the end)
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There are actually two wiki pages for this man :

Code: 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_R._Grinker_Sr.
Code: 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_Richard_Grinker

Edit : Ignore that... They are father and son, or grandfather and grandson.
 
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