The Kumar and Clark Medical Textbook has been updated for 2025, and Dr Charles Shepherd states that the new ME/CFS entry is even worse than the previous edition. We will be writing to the publishers about the revised entry.
The ME Association
Kumar and Clark is a popular medical textbook. Previous editions of the textbook have been criticised by the ME Association and others for its misleading and outdated entry on ME/CFS.
The ME Association has written to the publisher previously asking them to update the entry, and co-signed a petition calling for the entry to be updated in the new 2025 edition of the book.
This petition received a reply from the publishers, Elsevier, in February 2025, stating that they had seen the petition and planned to update the entry in the 2025 edition of the textbook, and that the changes would address the concerns of patient groups.
However the new edition has now been published, and it is very disappointing to see the revised entry doesn't address any of the concerns outlined within the petition.
Dr Charles Shepherd, MEA Hon. Medical Adviser, comments:
Kumar and Clark is a longstanding a very influential medical textbook.
The new (2025) edition has now been published and the revised entry and classification of ME/CFS is even worse – to say the very least.
The MEA has previously been in contact with the publishers of this major medical textbook to try and get them to produce up to date and accurate information on classification, cause and management of ME/CFS.
We will be writing to them again regarding the new entry.
My colleague Dr David Tuller has written a blog with an excellent critique on the new entry:
Dr Charles Shepherd,
Trustee and Hon. Medical Adviser to the ME Association,
Member of the 2018-2021 NICE guideline on ME/CFS committee,
Member of the 2002 Chief Medical Officer's Working Group on ME/CFS
