The CSP Charitable Trust funds vital ME research project

This year, with a team of experienced researchers and patient representatives, we gained funding through the CSP Charitable Trust’s post-doctoral research award scheme. The awards are open to chartered members and fund research projects for novice researchers and those with some experience of research.

Our funding will allow us to run a feasibility study exploring transauricular vagus nerve stimulation (tavns) for people with myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME). ME is a complex multi-system disease, with up to 80 per cent of cases occurring after an infection. It affects approximately 250,000 people in UK, although since the pandemic it is thought that this number has doubled. 

There is no recognised treatment or cure, with UK research funding mainly focusing on psychological and exercise approaches. However, the cardinal symptom of ME is post-exertional symptom exacerbation (PESE), so exercise cannot reduce PESE and can lead to significant harms.

This is counter to traditional delivery of physiotherapy, where exercise is the mainstay of treatment. 

As a founding member of Physios for ME we aim to research, educate and advocate to improve physiotherapy management for people with ME. Last year, we wrote 'A Physiotherapist’s Guide to Understanding and Managing ME/CFS to help physiotherapists understand how to support people with ME' in all areas of our work. 

We have also conducted a number of research studies on ways to support people to manage their symptoms. We recognise we cannot currently cure ME but we hope to find ways to manage symptoms until a cure is found. This funding from the CSP Charitable Trust will help us explore one potential management strategy – tavns for people with ME.