AHMF: Latest News

Review: Video - Who Will Protect the Children?
Gurli Bagnall
A report on the Foundation's video excerpt from the 2001 Clinical and Scientific Meeting.
"The cold, hard deliberateness with which the extensive scientific evidence of the physical nature of ME/CFS is routinely dismissed or ignored, goes beyond abuse. It speaks of an agenda that is not concerned with patient welfare...It is hard enough for sick adults to protect themselves against misdiagnoses and mistreatments, but this video highlighted that where children are concerned, some are even denied parental protection."
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6th International AACFS Conference
Dr Rosamund Vallings
Dr Vallings reports on three days of presentations and posters from the 2003 AACFS Conference, covering topics such as epidemiology, immunology, technology, physiology, psychosocial issues and treatment plans.
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Video: Who Will Protect the Children? now available
A video exerpt from the 2001 Clinical and Scientific Meeting is now available for purchase.
Young people severely affected by ME/CFS can face serious medical disbelief resulting in court enforced removal from their families. Serious physical symptoms are dismissed with shifting diagnoses such as somatoform disorder, abnormal illness behaviour, Munchausen's syndrome by proxy or hysteria.
Dr Nigel Speight, paediatrician, University Hospital of North Durham, UK, documents the serious risk factors for removal of the child with ME/CFS and relevant case histories, epidemiology, spectrum of severity and natural history of paediatric ME/CFS. John Chapman PhD recounts the experience of the "medical nightmare" faced by his family.
Description and order form.

2001 Proceedings now available
The Proceedings of the 2001 Clinical and Scientific Meeting are now available for sale. Copies are $50.00 (not including GST or international postage) and can be ordered by printing out, filling in and faxing the Order Form.

2001 Proceedings Preface now online
The Preface to the Proceedings of te 2001 Clinical and Scientific Meeting is now online.
People with ME face enormous obstacles to access equitable health care.
Among the impediments over the past decade has been research which shifted emphasis to fatigue, fatigue states and chronic fatigue with scant regard for the myriad yet distinguishing neurological, autonomic, and gastrointestinal features of ME.
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Invasion of the Bread Eaters
Australian Doctor's Weekly September 2002
Dr David Whitten
While I never again ventured into the world of market research, I must say I have always retained an interest in statistical analyses, and the validity of the interpretations that are drawn from them. Read article.

Submission to RACP Guidelines for CFS
AHMF, 1997
Christine Hunter, Annette Leggo, Anne Gotsis and Maureen Stephenson
This authoratative, readable document was prepared with reference to extensive scientific literature searches and updates, direct contact with international researchers and clinicians, and the experiences of people with ME/CFS documented over more than a decade. The submission provides concise information on many aspects of ME/CFS and can be reprinted without prior permission providing authorship is acknowledged.
Now uploaded as multiple pages for quicker download. Read submission.

Forget M.E. Not
September 1993
Alison Hunter, aged 16
Somewhere in the recesses of my mind there is a memory of being active, of having the energy to be active...when sprinting across the street was a reflex action and a good day was a day in the surf followed then by dinner at a new restaurant followed by a movie. Read more.

Chronic fatigue could flag depression
Medical Observer 19.07.02
Dr Jocelyn Lowinger
"Professor Ian Hickie, CEO of beyondblue: the national depression initiative and lead author of the study, said GPs should be aware "the great majority of people who come through their door with medically unexplained tiredness have unrecognised depression or anxiety."" Read more.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Clinical Practice Guidelines
Medical Journal of Australia 03.06.02
Richard Larkins and Simon Molesworth
"We acknowledge, as do the guidelines, that CFS is a serious, disabling illness...There is significant evidence of a range of biological abnormalities occurring in people with CFS. It remains unclear whether these are primary or secondary...Treatment plans should be worked out by the patient together with a healthcare professional and designed to be within the capabilities of the patient.
Scientific evidence on aetiology, pathophysiology and treatment is, at this stage, grossly deficient. More research is required to understand the biological mechanisms involved and to clarify the role that genetic, environmental and infectious agents might have in the aetiology and pathophysiology of this complex and debilitating illness." Read more.

Ignoring the evidence on chronic fatigue
Medical Observer 24.05.02
Dr A Breck McKay
"Editor: I have received and read the MJA claptrap on chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS).
If ever there was an argument to throw out the rigidity of the current misapplied 'evidence-based medicine' (read: 'only the evidence that has already conformed to our specific, accepted concepts, will be considered'), this is obviously it!" Read more.

Neurotic or Misunderstood?
TIME Magazine 20.05.02
Daniel Williams
"A close reading of the guidelines suggests patients aren't being over-sensitive. Though doctors are urged to acknowledge CFS patients' suffering, they're advised to "discourage excessive rest" to break the "vicious cycle" of inactivity, and urged to make a psychological evaluation of the patient and note any family history of "depressive disorder, self-destructive behaviour or substance misuse," before reaching a diagnosis." Read more.

New guidelines on chronic fatigue care
Australian Doctor 10.05.02
Bianca Nogrady
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) should be considered in the same way as migraine, where there is no clear pathology or diagnostic test but the condition is well recognised and taken seriously by practitioners, an Australian expert says. Read more.

Living with Pain of Chronic Fatigue
Canberra Times 09.05.02
Danielle Cronin, Health Reporter
"Canberra chronic fatigue syndrome sufferers are tired of attempts to "trivialise" their illness and are waging a public campaign to change perceptions.
ACT Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Society members, armed with blue ribbons, will visit local shopping centres in the lead-up to the International Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Awareness Day on May 12." Read more.

RACP Guidelines for the Treatment of CFS released
MJA website 06.05.02
See the MJA CFS Guidelines page for full text.
See responses to, and correspondence regarding, the second draft of the Guidelines: the Foundation's RACP Guidelines page.

Norman Swan Interviews Dr Robert Loblay
Health Matters, ABC Radio National 06.05.02
Norman Swan: While these guidelines have been in preparation, and also over this weekend you've been the subject of a lot of flak because with Chronic Fatigue at least in the Associations, have been saying these are dreadful guidelines. What's the essence of the criticism?
Rob Loblay: I think that there is a probably minority view that the guidelines are saying this is a psychological problem. This is in fact not the case, it's the exact opposite. What we've tried to do is give doctors other ways of thinking about therapy that will mesh better. Using for example, an educational strategy in the way they do with diabetes or asthma, or a rehabilitation approach in the way they might do with cardiac disease or chronic lung disease. Read more.

Riddle of the Quiet Killer
Sydney Morning Herald 04.05.02
Julie Robotham
"Despite a decade of crippling physical symptoms and abnormal pathology and neurology tests, medical science never came up with anything more tangible than chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) to describe [Alison Hunter's] illness. ...
Immunologist Dr Robert Loblay developed the new treatment guidelines for the Royal Australasian College of Physicians...It was a valid complaint that the research papers his group considered were distorted by the characteristics of study participants. "People who are too ill drop out," he said. "People who don't like psychological language drop out." Those who were house-bound could not take part, and had never been formally studied." Read more.

Brain link to Fatigue Syndrome
Sydney Morning Herald 04.05.02
Julie Robotham
"An area of the brain that controls the stomach receives substantially less blood in some people with chronic fatigue syndrome, a study shows.
The finding adds more weight to the argument that the controversial illness is biological, not psychological.
Brain scans of 40 chronic fatigue patients were carried out by Adelaide scientists and compared against the scans of healthy people. The director of nuclear medicine at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Dr Steven Unger, who headed the study along with neurologist Dr Rey Casse, said: "There was a very strong change in cerebral blood flow in patients." Read more.

Patients slam guidelines on chronic fatigue syndrome
Medical Observer 03.05.02
Helen Carter
"Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) patient groups have slammed Australia's first CFS clinical practice guidelines, saying they will lead to misdiagnosis, and inappropriate and inadequate medical care." Read more