Rowe, Katherine · Acta paediatrica (Oslo, Norway : 1992) · 2020 · DOI
This study followed 784 young people (ages 6-18) with ME/CFS over 14 years at a specialized clinic in Melbourne. The patients received help with symptom management and personalized lifestyle plans adjusted to their severity of illness and individual circumstances. Most patients who responded said the management approach helped them regain control of their lives and stay socially connected and engaged in school.
This study provides direct evidence of what young ME/CFS patients value most in their clinical care—understanding, appropriate pacing, and coordinated educational support. These patient-reported outcomes highlight the importance of comprehensive, individualized management and can inform clinical practice guidelines and healthcare policy to improve quality of life in pediatric ME/CFS.
This study does not establish causation between the management components and patient outcomes, nor does it prove that these interventions work better than alternative approaches, as there was no control group. The findings reflect patient perceptions rather than objective clinical measures, and the long study period (1991-2009) means practices and patient demographics may not reflect current pediatric ME/CFS populations.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
The first block is for the primary paper and is the citation you should use in research work. The atlas-snapshot line only applies if you are specifically referring to this atlas’s reading of the paper on the date shown.
Primary citation
Rowe, Katherine (2020). Paediatric patients with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome value understanding and help to move on with their lives.. Acta paediatrica (Oslo, Norway : 1992). https://doi.org/10.1111/apa.15054
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-rowe-2020-paediatric-patients,
author = {Rowe, Katherine},
title = {Paediatric patients with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome value understanding and help to move on with their lives.},
journal = {Acta paediatrica (Oslo, Norway : 1992)},
year = {2020},
doi = {10.1111/apa.15054},
note = {PubMed: 31854020},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/rowe-2020-paediatric-patients},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-29. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/rowe-2020-paediatric-patients
Contribute
Private, reviewed by a human. Not a public comment thread.