Thread by @TomKindlon

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Some extracts from “The politics underpinning the neglect of people with ME/#CFS” which summarises her paper “Towards a critical psychology of #chronicfatiguesyndrome: #biopsychosocial narratives & UK welfare reform” by @JoElizaHunt

mecentraal.wordpress.com/2022/06/19/the…

#MEcfs #PwME

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“The [#biopsychosocial] model has been used as psychosocial model, to re-frame chronic health conditions (particularly those surrounded by medical controversy or uncertainty) into psychosocial entities, allegedly amenable to psychosocial healthcare interventions (contd)”

#BPS

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“(Contd) and thus to ‘recovery’ and re-entry into the labour market. Such health conditions could thus be largely exempted from welfare provision, private disability insurance protection & on-going biomedical care, reducing state expenditure in these areas (contd)”
#MEcfs #CFS

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“(Contd) whilst boosting private sector profits in the disability insurance and rehabilitation industry”

#MyalgicEncephalomyelitis #ChronicFatigueSyndrome #MEcfs #CFS #PwME #MyalgicE #CFSME #MEeps #MEep #SEID

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“In the UK, this psychosocial model has been espoused by an ’academic-state-corporate nexus’, a term that describes associations between certain academic-clinicians with an interest in what they call #CFS, government officials & actors within the disability insurance industry”

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“In both #CFS & back pain, the approach was the same: differentiate ‘subjective complaints’ from ‘objective disease’, claim that ‘illness behaviour’ in the former is driven by ‘maladaptive’ behaviours & cognitions (contd.)”

#biopsychosocial #MEcfs #PwME #MyalgicE #CFSME #MyE

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“(Contd) and develop interventions that target this alleged maladaptive psychology, facilitating return to work. As part of this narrative, both back pain & #CFS…were positioned as ‘common health problems’, to be distinguished from ‘serious medical conditions’ (contd)”
#MEcfs

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“(Contd) whereby common health problems were deemed less worthy of biomedical healthcare & social security support. Here, the power of language (discourse) in constituting certain disabled people as not really disabled & thus unworthy of state support is evident”

#MEcfs #CFS

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“The marginalization of people with #ME/#CFS has been facilitated by the complicity of mainstream structures. For example, the UK press has historically bought into (bio)psychosocial discourse & largely misrepresented both #MECFS and people who live with the condition (Contd)”

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“(Contd) with not infrequent implication of deficient moral character [in #MEcfs]. Biases in academic publishing have replicated this dynamic”

#MyalgicEncephalomyelitis #ChronicFatigueSyndrome #MEcfs #CFS #PwME #CFSME #MyalgicE #CFIDS #SEID

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“Research suggests the lack of fit …between clinicians’ explanatory frameworks & clinical presentations of patients with #ME/#CFS threatens clinicians’ assumed expertise, leading to feelings of frustration, powerlessness, hopelessness, inadequacy & fear”

#MEcfs #PwME #CFSME

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“Negative stereotyping and poor treatment of such patients, widely documented in research, may thus be theorized as a clinical defence against medical uncertainty, threatened loss of expert status and associated discomfort”

#MyalgicEncephalomyelitis #ChronicFatigueSyndrome

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“These defences might also explain clinical victim blaming dynamics (clinicians blaming patients for their inability to recover) as can be found in research”

#MyalgicEncephalomyelitis #ChronicFatigueSyndrome #MEcfs #CFS #PwME #MyalgicE #CFSME #SEID #MEeps #MEep #PwMEs

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“can be found in research. That is, clinicians may seek to avoid the discomfort of medical uncertainty, protect their expert positioning and preserve moral value in the face of negative healthcare outcomes by shifting health-related accountability onto patients”

#MEcfs #PwME

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“victim blaming can be discerned in academic-state-corporate narratives around #MECFS, where blame is shifted onto chronically ill & disabled people, whilst actors within this nexus seek to cultivate expert status and moral legitimacy through claims of being ‘evidence-based’”

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“In a further parallel, clinical framing of ME/CFS as lacking in work ethic and stoicism can be observed in neoliberal government rhetoric regarding ‘undeserving disability’”

#MyalgicEncephalomyelitis #ChronicFatigueSyndrome #MEcfs #CFS #PwME #CFSME #CFIDS #ME

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“Power structures, politics and psychological investment implicated in the marginalization of people with #ME/#CFS, as discussed here, are likely also implicated in efforts from certain quarters to marginalize and psychologize #longCovid”

#PwLC #MEcfs #PostCovid #LC #PVFS