Question:
I am really amazed at the tenor of the discussion that we seem to be having
on a topic that has long since been "put to bed". The criteria for this
disease - whether we are patients in Canada or U.S.A. are the same! Would
one consider the criteria for "iris melanoma" to vary from country to
country? I wish that those who are now querying whether this is a real
disease would do a littlle reading- follow all the discusion that has taken
place over the last several years and learn that this syndrome really does
exist despite the fact that there are unknowing physicians and some
insurance companies have taken a time to be convinced! Listen to what
those who have been doing the REAL work are saying! This is not a
psychosomatic disease. Even the University of Toronto physician ( a
psychiatrist) who was interviewing patients for insurance claims and who
was putting us all down has now changed his tune!
Answer:
A couple of minor points here: first of all, nobody has diagnostic
criteria; certainly nothing as clear cut as melanoma diagnostic
criteria. What we all have is *research* criteria, and they do
vary from country to country. I don't know which criteria Canadian
MDs are using, but I would not be in the least surprised to find out
that they're using the British rather than the U.S. standards. This
is a big problem that the international CFS research community is
attempting to fix: hopefully, the new CDC criteria, due (supposedly)
at the beginning of August will reflect this.
