Those acting against the patients best interests should be struck off

princesschipchops, 18 February 2011:

LuxuryPlayer - ''Although an illness which is "all in the mind" is no less serious than an illness which is purely physical, or a mixture of both. To object to these findings in the way Action for ME and others are suggests that they themselves feel that illnesses "of the mind" are somehow less serious.''

God this makes me livid! It is not that we think illnesses of the mind are less serious! It is that for those of us who KNOW we are physically ill we know that we need people to research it properly and find a proper cure.

Your ridiculous argument is like saying that a diabetic given an asthma inhaler and not happy about it, somehow thinks asthma sufferers are inferior whereas they clearly would not think that, they would just think it is the wrong treatment for them!

When I was first ill I was told I had depression and I spent six months DOING MORE! To try and push myself out of it. Including at one point going on a holiday to France - which made me so ill I spent the whole week practically in bed. I finally saw a psychologist, a CBT therapist and then an occupation health consultant - all three did the depression inventories on me and all three declared I was not depressed. I have no stigma against depression - my mum has suffered with it in her life and it is very debilitating. However I wasn't getting better as I was getting the wrong treatment.

I finally got diagnosed and when I did I had to have a whole range of blood tests to rule out other things. They came back showing nothing definitive (i.e. diabetes) but they were off - I asked the doctor what that meant. He said 'oh they just show you are fighting off a virus at the moment.'

Every single blood test I have received since has shown the same things (low billirubin, off red blood count etc). So I have been 'fighting off a virus' for nearly three years! That is why for me and many like me I don't believe that it is 'all in the mind'. Neither does my immunologist. Thank god I had the money to see a medical doctor and specialist and didn't have to rely on getting all my help purely from shrinks, psychologists and others.

ME is classed as a neurological illness by the WHO. There IS NO debate on that. The UK government accepts it as such.

Those trying to create a debate are acting against the patients best interests and should be struck off. If you speak to bio-chemists, neurologists, immunologists, etc the majority believe ME to be a physical illness - those who believe it to be otherwise are predominantly shrinks. Don't forget that ten years ago those with ulcers were told they got them from 'stress' and before that those with MS and diabetes were labelled 'hysterics'.