Michael Sharpe

Professor Michael Sharpe, M.A., M.R.C.P., M.R.C.Psych., is a British professor of psychological medicine at the University of Oxford, in the United Kingdom. He is a key author of the PACE trial helping to devise the Oxford criteria as a diagnostic tool for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.

Notable studies

• 2017, Response to: "Do more people recover from chronic fatigue syndrome with cognitive behaviour therapy or graded exercise therapy than with other treatments?"

  "ABSTRACT - Background: Wilshire et al. suggest that we have overestimated the number of patients that recover from chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) after receiving a course of either cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) or graded exercise therapy (GET), as reported in a secondary analysis of outcome data from the Pacing, graded Activity and Cognitive behavior therapy; a randomized Evaluation (PACE) trial. We provide counter-arguments to this view. Purpose: To provide an alternative view to that offered by Wilshire et al. Methods: We review the two different analyses of PACE trial outcome data to estimate recovery, and compare these to other published trials and cohort studies. Results: While there is no gold standard for recovery from CFS, previous trials and cohort studies provide support for our analysis of recovery in the PACE trial. Our finding that 22% of participants recover from the current episode of CFS after either CBT or GET, compared to 8% after adaptive pacing therapy and 7% after specialist medical care alone, is consistent with the literature. Conclusions: Our original conclusions that '… recovery from CFS is possible, and that CBT and GET are the therapies most likely to lead to recovery’ is an important, reasonable, and hopeful message for both clinicians and patients."

• 2017, Long-term economic evaluation of cognitive-behavioural group treatment versus enhanced usual care for functional somatic syndromes
• 2011, PACE trial
• 2002, The report of the Chief Medical Officer's CFS/ME working group: what does it say and will it help?
• 1998, Doctors' diagnoses and patients' perceptions. Lessons from chronic fatigue syndrome
• 1997, Chronic fatigue syndrome. A practical guide to assessment and management

Books

• 2008, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (The Facts)
• 2003 ABC of Psychological Medicine (ABC Series)
• 1999, Chronic Fatigue and its Syndromes
• 1995 Treatment of Functional Somatic Symptoms

Quotations

• 2015, "It’s sometimes quite hard to understand what motivates the very vocal minority that gets so upset about this apparently benign bit of moderately helpful treatment."
• 2015, "These are not magic cures. This is just the only game in town really in terms of an evidence-based treatment if you have got this condition to get yourself improved."
• 1999, "Purchasers and Health Care providers with hard pressed budgets are understandably reluctant to spend money on patients who are not going to die and for whom there is controversy about the 'reality' of their condition (and who) are in this sense undeserving of treatment...Those who cannot be fitted into a scheme of objective bodily illness yet refuse to be placed into and accept the stigma of mental illness remain the undeserving sick of our society and our health service"
• MEActionUK Quotes from Mike Sharpe

Media coverage and interviews

• 2015, Chronic fatigue patients criticise study that says exercise can help - Guardian 28 Oct 2015
• 2013, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome 2 - Lancet TV on YouTube (about the PACE trial)
• 2011 Comparison of treatments for chronic fatigue syndrome - the PACE trial -ABC.Net.AU Radio (with transcript)

Online presence

• Twitter

List of publications

• PubMed
• University of Oxford - Michael Sharpe

Learn more

• 2005, A Response to Michael Sharpe

See also

• Peter White
• Simon Wessely
• Trudie Chalder
• Esther Crawley
• PACE trial

Oxford University a prestigious university located in Oxford, England renowned for its teaching and research in health and medicine

cognition Thought processes, including attention, reasoning, and memory.

cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) - A type of psychotherapy geared toward modifying alleged unhealthy thinking, behaviors or illness beliefs. One of the treatment arms used in the controversial PACE trial.

graded exercise therapy (GET) - A gradual increase in exercise or activity, according to a pre-defined plan. Focuses on overcoming the patient's alleged unhelpful illness beliefs that exertion can exacerbate symptoms, rather than on reversing physical deconditioning. Considered controversial, and possibly harmful, in the treatment or management of ME. One of the treatment arms of the controversial PACE trial.

pacing The practice of staying within one's "energy envelope" or personal limit by combining periods of activity with periods of rest or avoiding exerting beyond a certain level. ME/CFS patients use pacing to avoid or reduce post-exertional malaise (PEM). Some patients use a heart rate monitor to help with pacing.

cognition Thought processes, including attention, reasoning, and memory.

PACE trial A controversial study which claimed that CBT and GET were effective in treating "CFS/ME", despite the fact that its own data did not support this conclusion. Its results and methodology were widely disputed by patients, scientists, and the peer-reviewed scientific literature.

somatic An adjective relating to the physical body or physical symptoms. It is often contrasted with the adjective "psychological", which refers to the human mind or mental symptoms. In biology, "somatic cells" refer to all the cells of the body, except those which form an egg or sperm.

somatic symptom disorder A psychiatric term to describe an alleged condition whereby a person's thoughts somehow cause physical symptoms. The actual existence of such a condition is highly controversial, due to a lack of scientific evidence. It is related to other psychiatric terms, such as "psychosomatic", "neurasthenia", and "hysteria". Older terms include "somatization", "somatoform disorder", and "conversion disorder". Such terms refer to a scientifically-unsupported theory that claims that a wide range of physical symptoms can be created by the human mind, a theory which has been criticized as "mind over matter" parapsychology, a pseudoscience.