Friday, July 30, 2010

Research Studies and the CDC

sigh....I saw this list of recent CFS studies this morning on a list I subscribe to and just had to share it with you - it's such an obvious example of all that's wrong with how the CDC approaches CFS.

These two items were listed:

 2. RES: Detection of an infectious retrovirus, XMRV, in blood cells of
     patients with chronic fatigue syndrome
  3. RES: Personality Features and Personality Disorders in Chronic Fatigue
     Syndrome: A Population-Based Study - CDC/Emory study

The first one (#2) is from the Whittemore-Peterson Institute, an addendum to their orginal Science article on XMRV in CFS, detailing exactly what kinds of tests they used to detect XMRV so that other organizations can replicate their results - very useful, real science.

The second item (#3) is the CDC's most recent study on CFS.  It's just so absurd and un-helpful, it speaks for itself, don't you think? 

Which research would you rather hear about, how to detect a newly discovered retrovirus in your blood or what personality features are commonly found in people with CFS? 

FYI, these are both from a list I subscribe to through Co-Cure.

8 comments:

Never That Easy said...

Ugh. Typical, unfortunately. How annoying.

Dawn said...

Thanks for sharing this information. I suddenly feel as if we have jumped back 20 years (based on the second study). So sad, and useless.

Renee said...

As my mom would say, "What a crock of bull!"

Pamela said...

typical, but not surprising ... :(

Toni said...

I second Renee's comment.

mto said...

Well, I think it's clear that they still think it's psychosomatic, and they're looking for "proof" of that.

David said...

The CDC Hustle ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XjyQbK5ttk

katy said...

So sad. Still approaching it on some level as a mental disorder rather than a physical. What a waste of time and research dollars.