David Tuller

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David M. Tuller, DrPh, or Dave Tuller, is a Senior Fellow in Public Health in Journalism at the Center of Global Public Health, School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley, California and regularly writes about research on myalgic encephalomyelitis and chronic fatigue syndrome and other frequently misunderstood illnesses.[1] Previously to his current appointment at Berkeley in July 2017, he was academic coordinator of the University of California, Berkeley's joint masters program in public health and journalism. He worked as a reporter and editor for ten years at the San Francisco Chronicle, served as health editor at Salon.com, and frequently writes about health for The New York Times.[2]

He is an experienced public health activist with a background as an ACT UP activist, which included an arrest at the Wall Street demonstration in 1987.[3]

PACE trial[edit | edit source]

David Tuller covered the PACE trial results for The New York Times in February 2011.[4] However he became concerned about the trial and wrote a further article regarding case definitions, which resulted in a letter to the editor in response from the PACE trial authors. This led to him investigating the trial and its authors further after contact with others in the patient community.[5][6]

Tuller is sympathetic toward the cause of the myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) patient community. In an article in 2015 he wrote:

"In the course of my reporting, I’d realized that the disease was both devastating and widely misunderstood. People were really, really sick—some were homebound for months and years at a stretch. Yet their condition had been saddled with one of the most condescending names ever given a major illness."[7]

In June 2017 after writing dozens of articles and organizing open letters on the PACE trial, David Tuller sought crowdfunding help from the ME/CFS patient community to continue his work on investigating the PACE trial. MEAction had an exclusive interview about his crowdfunding effort.[8] He raised it on Crowdrise Virology Blog's Trial By Error: Reporting on PACE, ME/CFS and Related Issues (2017) and succeeded and actually exceeded his goal within four weeks. The funds raised went to the Center for Scientific Integrity who transferred them to the School of Public Health at University of California, Berkeley, which in turn created a position for Tuller to continue his investigative work.[9][10]

In 2019, Tuller began by covering the UK Parliament Appropriate ME Treatment debate, criticizing both the UK government response from Under-secretary Steve Brine, and the ME/CFS training course offered by the Royal College of General Practitioners which Steve Brine had praised during the debate.[11]

Medically unexplained symptoms[edit | edit source]

From 2018 to 2021, Tuller renewed his crowdfunding campaign, expanding his focus well beyond ME/CFS treatment trials and the error-ridden PACE trial to cover anything under the increasingly large Medically Unexplained Symptoms / Persistent Physical Symptoms / "Functional" symptoms banner, including Irritable bowel syndrome, fibromyalgia, FND including non-epileptic seizures, and, since 2020, Long COVID.[12]

Topics attracting Tuller's attention have included possible ethics violations, research bias and methodological flaws in research, inappropriate psychologization[13] inaccurate media reporting of science,[14] the legitimization and promotion of pseudoscience based on neurolinguistic programming (NLP) and "brain training",[15] genetics based research,[16] a number of Cochrane's systematic reviews and its complaints process,[17] research funding decisions,[18] and changes to existing ME/CFS treatment guidelines.[19][20][21]

Education[edit | edit source]

  • 2005, Masters in Public Health from University of California, Berkeley[22]
  • Doctor of Public Health

Awards[edit | edit source]

  • 2016, IACFS/ME Special Service Award - for outstanding personal effort and contribution to the CFS/ME community[23]
  • 2016, Tymes Trust Award for Scientific Journalism[24]

Talks and interviews[edit | edit source]

Writings about ME/CFS[edit | edit source]

Trial By Error on Virology Blog (Older posts can be found on Trial By Error)

2020[edit | edit source]

(Older blog entries can be found on the Trial By Error page.)

New York Times[edit | edit source]

Other print media[edit | edit source]

Online presence[edit | edit source]

See also[edit | edit source]

Learn more[edit | edit source]

References[edit | edit source]

  1. ↑ "TWiV Special: Tear it up with David Tuller | This Week in Virology". Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  2. ↑ "David Tuller". UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  3. ↑ Petrelis, Michael (May 21, 2013). "Jay Blotcher's ACT UP & Friends Reunion in San Francisco". Petrelis Files. Retrieved April 20, 2019. [O]ur friend David Tuller. Back in 1987 at ACT UP's first demonstration on Wall Street, he was among the arrestees...the Wall Street 17
  4. ↑ Tuller, David (February 17, 2011). "Psychotherapy Eases Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Study Says". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  5. ↑ Tuller, David (March 4, 2011). "Troubles of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Start With Defining It". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  6. ↑ http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/health/15letters-STUDYINGAFAT_LETTERS.html
  7. ↑ "Reporter Excoriates Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Study: I Stopped at 14,000 Words-Enough Was Enough". Cal Alumni Association. November 18, 2015. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  8. ↑ Tuller on PACE Investigation Plans: Not Beholden to anyone.
  9. ↑ "Click here to support Virology Blog's Trial By Error: Reporting on PACE, ME/CFS and Related Issues by David Tuller". CrowdRise. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  10. ↑ "This Week in Virology". facebook.com. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  11. ↑ Tuller, David (January 28, 2018). "Trial By Error: Steve Brine's Troubling Claim in Parliamentary Debate on ME". Virology blog. Retrieved January 28, 2019.
  12. ↑ Tuller, David (October 20, 2020). "Trial By Error: Some Thoughts on Long-Covid, ME/CFS and MUS". Virology blog.
  13. ↑ Tuller, David (March 2, 2020). "Trial By Error: New Biopsychosocial". Virology blog.
  14. ↑ Tuller, David (January 13, 2020). "Trial By Error: The 2018 PACE Reanalysis and the SMC's Expert Appraisals". Virology blog.
  15. ↑ Tuller, David (May 2, 2020). "Trial By Error: Norway's Proposed Lightning Process Trial". Virology blog.
  16. ↑ Tuller, David (January 13, 2020). "Trial By Error: The UK's Proposed Genetics Study". Virology blog.
  17. ↑ Tuller, David (September 3, 2018). "Trial By Error: The Cochrane Controversy". Virology blog. Retrieved October 17, 2018.
  18. ↑ Tuller, David (January 8, 2020). "Trial By Error: NIH Funding "Needs Life Support," Says Jennie Spotlight". Virology blog.
  19. ↑ Tuller, David (October 7, 2021). "Trial By Error: UC Berkeley's October Crowdfunding Campaign". Virology blog.
  20. ↑ https://crowdfund.berkeley.edu/project/9730
  21. ↑ https://crowdfund.berkeley.edu/project/22602
  22. ↑ "David Tuller". UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  23. ↑ "IACFS/ME Awardees". IACFS/ME. Retrieved April 23, 2020.
  24. ↑ "Tymes Trust". Facebook. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  25. ↑ "TWiV 397: Trial by Error". This Week in Virology. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  26. ↑ "International ME Conferences and Colloquiums Home Page". investinme.org. Retrieved August 14, 2019.
  27. ↑ Wilshire, C; Kindlon, T; Courtney, R; Matthees, A; Tuller, D; Geraghty, K; Levin, B (2018). "Rethinking the treatment of chronic fatigue syndrome—A reanalysis and evaluation of findings from a recent major trial of graded exercise and CBT". BMC psychology. 6 (1): 1–12. doi:10.1186/s40359-018-0218-3.
  28. ↑ Geraghty, Keith; Jason, Leonard; Sunnquist, Madison; Blease, Charlotte; Tuller, David; Adeniji, Charles (February 2019). "The 'Cognitive Behavioural Model' of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Critique of a Flawed Model". Journal of Health Psychology. 6 (1): 2055102919838907. doi:10.1177/2055102919838907.

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.

medically unexplained physical symptoms (MUPS) - Technically, this term means that no cause or explanation for the patient's symptoms has yet been found. However, patients diagnosed with "MUPS" are generally lumped into a psychosomatic, or psychologically-caused category by those in the medical profession, without any scientific basis for doing so.

See ME/CFS.

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.

The BMJ (previously the British Medical Journal) is a weekly peer-reviewed medical journal.

BMJ The BMJ (previously the British Medical Journal) is a weekly peer-reviewed medical journal.

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.

See Graded exercise therapy.

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.

See cognitive behavioral therapy.

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

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