ETUDE: Encompassing Training in fUnctional Disorders across Europe

[Hoopoe]

Science for ME has been good at launching petitions. Can we make a petition that asks the EU to stop funding psychosomatic research of this kind?

With enough signatures, the psychosomatic theorists will have a harder time to convince the EU commission to give them any more money. Maybe it will even result in a sudden stop of ongoing funding.

 

[Trish]

On their website there's a short series of podcasts which the students on the project made on each of the six monthly occasions when they gathered together to be taught about how to diagnose functional somatic disorders and tell each other about their research. I listened to a couple. They come across as eager young students keen to learn and do good research and naively parroting all the stuff they've been told by the likes of Carson, Stone, Burton, Rossmalen et al. who are their supervisors.

 

[NelliePledge]

Speechless

 

[Solstice]

On their website there's a short series of podcasts which the students on the project made on each of the six monthly occasions when they gathered together to be taught about how to diagnose functional somatic disorders and tell each other about their research. I listened to a couple. They come across as eager young students keen to learn and do good research and naively parroting all the stuff they've been told by the likes of Carson, Stone, Burton, Rossmalen et al. who are their supervisors.

Somehow academia never strikes me as very welcoming of critical thinking. At least not these fields.

 

[bobbler]

Funding page for the project, https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/956673

"A new era in functional disorders research
Functional disorders (FD) comprise conditions with chronic somatic symptoms that cannot however be associated with specific pathophysiological mechanisms. Although FD affect nearly 7 % of the population, imposing a high socioeconomic burden, the way different medical specialities conceive these disorders leads to fragmented and insufficient health care for patients. The EU-funded ETUDE project aims to address this problem by offering a sustainable and structured training programme to early-stage researchers. By educating the new generation of scientists to work across disciplines, the project will provide the skills to develop products and services that improve care for FD patients."

"Objective

Functional Disorders (FD) are clusters of chronic somatic symptoms that currently cannot be associated to reproducibly observable pathophysiological mechanisms. FD can affect every organ system, individuals of all ages, ethnic groups and socioeconomic strata, although the risk is increased in women and lower socioeconomic strata. Women are 9 times more likely to receive an FD diagnosis, even after adjustment for the severity of symptoms. Functional limitations are as severe in FD as in well-defined chronic physical diseases. Direct medical costs and indirect costs as a consequence of sick leave and disability are high. FD cause relevant annual excess costs in health care that are comparable to mental health problems like depression or anxiety disorders, and which may be reduced by interventions targeting physicians as well as patients. About 7% of the population is affected to such a degree that they qualify for psychiatric treatment. However, this remains hidden due to diagnostic practices that vary between fields.

Psychosomatic medicine, clinical psychology and medical specialties all have their own and different concepts of FD having important consequences for patients. These challenges result in a lack of knowledge on FD, leading to fragmented and insufficient health care for patients with FD, and a society in which patients with FD experience stigma from both the society as well as from health care professionals. There is an urgent need to solve the fragmented and insufficient education and research landscape.

Therefore, the goal of ETUDE is the development of a sustainable and structured training programme in order to educate a new generation of interdisciplinary creative early stage researchers that are able to cross disciplines and to translate theory and experimental models to products and services that improve care for patients."

well that is flying high on buzzword bingo! 'in order to educate a new generation of interdisciplinary creative early stage researchers...' and so on, if it was SEO on the search engines that it would get flagged by today's algorithms for being 'too stuffed' with search terms vs actual content.


I do have to flag and question the claim:

About 7% of the population is affected to such a degree that they qualify for psychiatric treatment.

I'm assuming they are at least hoping that most readers will be led to believe that as 7% of the entire population, so when nudged to suggest certain demographics it becomes the equivalent of 'all people with x coloured-hair and eyes ... who you will find with secertly have some history you suspect of trainspotting'. Although I think we know and can guess what real terms will be suggested in there.

It's outrageous they get away with it because it is basically 'all x are mad and are costing the country a fortune, unless you let us control them for you' propaganda isn't it?

 

[bobbler]

Does this fill you with despair?

The whole thing seems to be based on the premise that all so called functional symptoms are psychosomatic, and therefore all conditions and syndromes which don't currently have a proven biological basis can be lumped together. In treatment terms this leads to the assumption that a generic psychological treatment will be appropriate, no doubt some variation on CBT of the brainwashing variety, and healthy living - diet, exercise, sleep hygiene, positive thoughts etc.

We'll all be signed up for generic treatment apps that make a few psychologists a shed load of money, and told to stop pestering our doctors and go back to work.

I just wish that these inventors of it were required to live as subjects of their own dystopian world they've created for these others [that I assume they either have unexplanable intense dislike for, or just callously disregard the impact on whilst they focus on their own other beliefs and amibitions without questioning them]

It seems fair and appropriate, given their claims, for them to have to be submitted under it themselves for say 4yrs+ before they can go forward claiming it doesn't cause harm.. put their hands up first for it, and I mean properly submit to the insinuations that will affect their freedom to all sorts forever so they truly get the full experience. And of course it would need to be implemented onto them, rather than trust me I'm doing it at home stuff...

 

[bobbler]

On their website there's a short series of podcasts which the students on the project made on each of the six monthly occasions when they gathered together to be taught about how to diagnose functional somatic disorders and tell each other about their research. I listened to a couple. They come across as eager young students keen to learn and do good research and naively parroting all the stuff they've been told by the likes of Carson, Stone, Burton, Rossmalen et al. who are their supervisors.

well they can spot vulnerable all right. And being in their hands to pass and even be able to get on with the rest of your career even if you didn't want a piece of this if you realise... would be one of those things.

I think medicine needs to stop being allowed to talk about personalities and 'pretend epidemiology' being used to hide plain bigotry-propaganda - in order to prevent disparagement in order to gain power 'in the name of'. Any freedom they've been given based on dodgy 'maybe there is some connection' has been firmly misplaced can be the only conclusion by now, along with them having had enough decades and produced little proper science on it evidencing it (just correlations from badly designed 'studies').

Medicine is a particularly vulnerable case because of the tendency for the students to be told what should be on their form 'to apply' and then being siloed to generally not hang around with people even on other courses even at university [to the extent other courses would]. Which only becomes more likely to be insular later on. Some will of course make friends with the bricklayer and bank clerk who has different experience and views and background to them and actually be interested and hear them, but others can indeed avoid doing so in a way that is particularly peculiar to just a few professions. The 'we were all top of our class' myth, which still puzzles me, then reinforces.

And their only experience of 'these others' then talked about becomes inputted into their brains by people like this. It would be called indoctrination in any other circumstance.

 

[Sean]

"An etude is a short, tricky tune that a musician plays mainly for practice or to demonstrate skill."