Patients with severe ME/CFS need hope and expert multidisciplinary care
Reframing beliefs about illness, along with specialist rehabilitation, can help recovery in people with severe ME/CFS, write Alastair Miller, Fiona Symington, Paul Garner, and Maria Pedersen Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) affects around 250 000 people in the UK. Symptoms include fatigue, cognitive difficulties, pain, autonomic disturbances, disturbed sleep, and gastrointestinal upset. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) estimates that 25% of people with ME/CFS experience higher symptom levels and reduced function.1 These disabilities, and the patients’ belief that they won’t recover, can harm their mental wellbeing.2 Recovery is possible, but patients need help to find their path. A constructive starting point requires experienced practitioners to recognise that the evolved biological control systems responsible for maintaining safety can sometimes become dysregulated.34 This perspective offers patients a coherent explanatory model
