Tollit, Michelle, Politis, Jennifer, Knight, Sarah · The Journal of school health · 2018 · DOI
This review looked at 36 studies examining how ME/CFS affects students' school experiences. Researchers found that most studies only measured school absences, but didn't thoroughly look at other important aspects like grades, motivation, or what support students receive. The review highlights that we need better ways to measure and understand how ME/CFS impacts all areas of school life.
Many students with ME/CFS struggle significantly in school, yet their experiences have been largely invisible in research beyond counting missed days. This review shows that we're missing crucial information about how ME/CFS affects grades, motivation, classroom participation, and access to support services—gaps that must be filled to help students succeed educationally.
This review does not establish the severity of school dysfunction, nor does it quantify how many students are affected. It also does not prove causation between ME/CFS and school problems—only that existing studies focus heavily on attendance while neglecting other important measures of school functioning.
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
Tollit, Michelle, Politis, Jennifer, & Knight, Sarah (2018). Measuring School Functioning in Students With Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: A Systematic Review.. The Journal of school health. https://doi.org/10.1111/josh.12580
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-tollit-2018-measuring-school,
author = {Tollit, Michelle and Politis, Jennifer and Knight, Sarah},
title = {Measuring School Functioning in Students With Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: A Systematic Review.},
journal = {The Journal of school health},
year = {2018},
doi = {10.1111/josh.12580},
note = {PubMed: 29224219},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/tollit-2018-measuring-school},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-29. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/tollit-2018-measuring-school
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