It has been 3 years since the Chief Medical Officer reported on chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis (CFS/ME) and the time has come for a thorough investigation by an All Party Group drawn from the House of Commons and the House of Lords. We have received many written submissions and are engaged in taking oral evidence in 2‐h sessions, which we open to the public as well as interested groups. The group has received a fantastic response to its requests for written evidence over the past few months. Questions that arise for a government response are the lack of provision and support for patients with CFS/ME, the issue of the clinical definition of CFS/ME, the need for a diagnostic test for CFS/ME, effectiveness of the National Institute for Clinical Excellence guidelines, and criteria used to decide which treatments are best for patients with CFS or myalgic encephalomyelitis.
Background: A requirement of the Government's Pathways to Work (PtW) agenda was to introduce a Condition Management Programme (CMP). The aim of the present study was to identify the differences between those who engaged and made progress in this telephone-based biopsychosocial intervention, in terms of their health, and those who did not and to determine the client and practitioner characteristics and programme elements associated with success in a programme aimed at improving health. Methods: Data were obtained from the CMP electronic spreadsheets and clients paper-based case records. CMP standard practice was that questionnaires were administered during the pre- and post-assessment phases over the telephone. Each client's record contains their socio-demographic data, their primary health condition, as well as the pre- and post-intervention scores of the health assessment tool administered. Univariate and multivariate statistical analysis was used to investigate the relationships between the database variables. Clients were included in the study if their records were available for analysis from July 2006 to December 2007. Results: On average there were 112 referrals per month, totalling 2016 referrals during the evaluation period. The majority (62.8%) of clients had a mental-health condition. Successful completion of the programme was 28.5% (575 "completers"; 144 "discharges"). Several factors, such as age, health condition, mode of contact, and practitioner characteristics, were significant determinants of participation and completion of the programme. The results showed that completion of the CMP was associated with a better mental-health status, by reducing the number of clients that were either anxious, depressed or both, before undertaking the programme, from 74% to 32.5%. Conclusions: Our findings showed that an individual's characteristics are associated with success in the programme, defined as completing the intervention and demonstrating an improved health status. This study provides some evidence that the systematic evaluation of such programmes and interventions could identify ways in which they could be improved.
