Norwegian health authorities classify Lightning Process as alternative treatment

NAFKAM (Norway's National Research Center in Complementary and Alternative Medicine), The Norwegian Directorate of Health and the Consumer Ombudsman state in an update of today about Lightning Process (LP) that it is to be considered as alternative treatment.

This is great news, as the laws concerning alternative treatment in Norway are very strict. LP-practitioners have tried to present themselves as just providing a lecture in self help, but that won't be as easy to get away with from now on.

LP has also been covered A LOT in media, an LP-instructor has written regular blog posts and articles in medical newspapers and held lectures for students of medicine, doctors assessing applications for sickness benefits etc. This has led to quite a lot of trust into Lightning Process, and it is often recommended by health personell to ME-patients. I SO hope this updated information will put a stop to that!

The statement is at the website Nifab, which belongs to NAFKAM (Norway's National Research Center in Complementary and Alternative Medicine)

Nifab: Lightning Process
google translation: Lightning Process

Norwegian LP instructors have maintained over time that they are not subject to the alternative treatment legislation. Their main argument for this has been that they do not offer health-related treatment according to §2 of the Act , but are teaching self-help techniques without the responsibility for treatment that accompanies this Act. In such a perspective, the safety of patients attending LP courses to combat their health problems will be different.

NAFKAM, the Consumer Ombudsman and the Norwegian Directorate of Health are in agreement with their own assessments of this and stand by that Lightning Process is perceived as health-related treatment, which is mainly done outside the healthcare system, because the method aims at remedying various health problems and the courses have a therapeutic / health-related goal in which the instructors interpret the patient's symptoms. LP instructors are therefore to be regarded as alternative therapists covered by the regulation as set out in the Act and the corresponding regulations.

 

HURRA!

That is great news.

 

I assume your thinking can we then use this reclassification to discredit "science based" treatments based on this quackery.

 

With the rest of the quacks...

 

Now we just need CBT and GET to be classified as alternative treatment

Might as well be describing CBT and GET to be honest

 

Sounds like good news. Congratulations to all who worked to draw attention to this problem.

 

When I initally read the title, I jumped to the unpleasant conclusion it meant "Norwegian health authorities classify Lightning Process as a valid alternative treatment", but very heartened once I realised it means "Norwegian health authorities classify Lightning Process as being subject to the alternative treatment legislation". Excellent.

 

@Barry exactly! And the laws are very strict regarding documentation of any claims you make and responsibility for patients welfare.

 

The "Patient Organisation" Recovery Norge - basically a Facebookpage promoting Lightning Process, led on by MD Henrik Vogt and LP-coach Live Landmark - is trying to make Lightning Process seem as serious and scientifically valid as possible.

Today they've posted twice about the magnificent Esther Crawley and her SMILE trial.





I don't know if it is wort the effort to comment on the posts. All critical comments have been deleted. But it worries me that there are some health personell following this Facebookpage.

 

I had thought that the Recovery Norge group was just run by idiots, but actually they seem quite nastily manipulative.

 

The way they have to insert disclaimers in every sentence really undermines their message, though

More people should be able to read between the lines and wonder why they can’t promise a single thing without also mentioning that it won’t work for everyone and not everyone it works for will actually get well.

Besides, bragging that SMILE is the first scientific study on this is also saying that nothing they have claimed so far could actually be backed by science

 

Yes, we need to keep an eye on them. They recently held a lecture on a seminar on MUPS about ME. The senior doctor from the national center of expertise on CFS/ME also held a lecture, she is known for a biopsychosocial approach to ME, is very enthusiastic about the SMILE-trial and her center recently invited Recovery Norge to hold a lecture for her team. By listening to Recovery Norge they can say they are listening to patients, so this "patient organisation" is quite popular among some doctors.

Programme: Emnekurs MUPS (medisinsk uforklarte plager og sykdommer - Hva vet vi og hva gjør vi?
google translation of programme: MUPS (Medically Unexplained Disorders and Diseases) - What do we know and what do we do?

From the programme:
How does early strain change into later onset?
Anna Luise Kirkengen

User involvement and patient centering - Is the patient always right?
Kirsti Malterud, Stein Nilsen and Aase Aamland

Helpful strategies in the face of patients with MUPS.
Peter Prydz

CFS / ME: What did sick and what did recovery - Experience from Recovery Norway
Henrik Vogt, Mette Høvern and Thomas Overvik

 

I've just realise how clever MUPS is, sorry for being a bit slow. Psychoquacks have always liked to occupy the space on the edge of what can medically be explained, whatever illnesses those may be at a particular time. Now with the MUPS umbrella, as illnesses become explained over time and the psychs have to find a new group of vulnerable victims who are ill but no-one knows why yet, all they have to do is redefine MUPS. Update it, no longer include some diseases (of course we weren't talking about ME as defined in that study where they found something, we were talking about all the other people with chronic fatigue). There will always be a MUPS, with expenses paid conferences where experts review what it includes or no longer includes. Jobs for the boys in perpetuity.

Basically they are just formalising what they've always been doing - "If it can't be explained yet, we'll have that one", but without having to argue their case for a specific illness each time, and trying to give the whole territory-grabbing exercise a respectable face. The naming, the branding - brilliant. "Of course it's MUPS - those are medically unexplained physical symptoms" - they know that they'll never go far wrong underestimating people with a vested interest's ability to willingly fall for such a circular argument.

And there I was thinking it was just another silly acronym.

 

I'm not on FB or Twitter but is there a way to link to this twitter thread?
https://twitter.com/user/status/923120209799589888

eta:
or this one:
https://twitter.com/user/status/947483757803704322

 

omg. You know Esther's memoirs will be called My Long Walk to Freedom or something

 

'I did it for the children' (?) wearing a white tea towel with a blue band a la mother theresa?

 

Sorry for repeating the same pic - but the last time I did it at the other place, after a while when you did a google search for EC, it was one of the first pictures that turned up, which amused me.

 

well the one I posted at the other place still comes up on the first page


eta: there appear to be a lot more pictures of EC on the net these days