Comments on: Psychotropic prescriptions for children soar; conflicts of interest, informed consent under scrutiny http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/0096 from the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons Sat, 20 Mar 2010 18:19:08 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Conflict of Interest Rampant in Child Drug Prescriptions « DC: Infowarrior and Xubuntuphile http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/0096/comment-page-1#comment-2104 Conflict of Interest Rampant in Child Drug Prescriptions « DC: Infowarrior and Xubuntuphile Sat, 06 Dec 2008 17:29:35 +0000 http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/?p=96#comment-2104 [...] Association of American Physicians and Surgeons November 10, 2008 [...] [...] Association of American Physicians and Surgeons November 10, 2008 [...]

]]> By: Mark deGuzman, MD http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/0096/comment-page-1#comment-1993 Mark deGuzman, MD Tue, 11 Nov 2008 22:44:03 +0000 http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/?p=96#comment-1993 For years now I have been saying that children are being overmedicated for what appears to be behavioral problems and not true disease. I work in an ED and see all too often the number of kids (as well as adults) on medications for bipolar disorder/ADHD/etc. and have to question the diagnosis. It seems appropriate parental upbringing and the abiltiy to discipline your children has given way to the "just prescribe a pill" attitude, which seems to be so prevalent these days. Why? beacause it's easier. I am also waiting for the other shoe to drop in that we don't really know what these medications are going to do these young developing minds and bodies. I'm sure the medications help some kids [and their teachers/parent(s)], but at what cost? For years now I have been saying that children are being overmedicated for what appears to be behavioral problems and not true disease. I work in an ED and see all too often the number of kids (as well as adults) on medications for bipolar disorder/ADHD/etc. and have to question the diagnosis. It seems appropriate parental upbringing and the abiltiy to discipline your children has given way to the “just prescribe a pill” attitude, which seems to be so prevalent these days. Why? beacause it’s easier.

I am also waiting for the other shoe to drop in that we don’t really know what these medications are going to do these young developing minds and bodies. I’m sure the medications help some kids [and their teachers/parent(s)], but at what cost?

]]> By: Francesco Martino http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/0096/comment-page-1#comment-1992 Francesco Martino Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:41:27 +0000 http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/?p=96#comment-1992 Well, what can I say? M aybe isever toolate for this huge problem to be brought up. I am surprised that only few voices are talking about what has been happening to children during the last two years in the USA. The useof medication hs become the standard educational practice and the practice of psychiatry has been reduced to behavioral control. To the reader who says "because they help people" my answer is: "then why to force them? Because this is the reality of the present state of affair. Family are being overtly/covertly convinced/forced to put their children on psychothropic medications and a number of interests are being satisfied in this way. There is no mention of the fact that the vast majority of children's behavioral and emotional problems are the expression of present sociocultural conditions and there are several factors that have contributed to the medicalization of children's malaise. One of the most important of them is the fact that psychiatry in the USA came under the control of big business and had to start to fabricate mental illness whenever and wherever possible in order to increase the source of revenues. As for 2006 psychiatric hospitalization acoounted for more than 20% percent of all hoospital stays. Big business found in the pool of children with State Insurances and low socio-economic status a practicllly inexhaustible sorce of psychiatric patients. Hospital became more aggressive in providing care for children and they could use the alibi of need and lack of resources to ask for more money. The psychiatric leadership on the other side saw the possibility of building careers, passing itself as new scientific authority and accumulating huge amounts of money with the support of the Pharmacetical Industry ready to provide the marketing oand the experts for this mass scale operation of misleading and blinding the public. The reality is that the prescription of medication to children to control their behavior is not based on medical knowledge but is a practice that has been embraced by a decadent society that is witnessing helplessly its breakdown. In no case these medications need to be given to children because they are not treating or curing any disease. Any true physician knows that the problems that children are having are not diseases by any far stretch. These problems have been present in different societies and throughout history and they have beentreated differently. Controlling children's disturbiing behaviors with drugs is a late fad in the history of mankind that developed in the USA in the last part Of the 20th century. therefore this practice belongs outside the realm of Medicine and in the realm of behavioral and social control. The breakdown of the families and the ill advised educational policies of the school systems are the two other factors that have strongly contributed to the epidemics of diagnosis in children and to the use of psychotropic. Families have become incresingly permissive and their natural structure has been destryed therefore they have failed in raising healthy children and have lost their control of them. The shools have been unable to engage these children in education and by setting unrealistic policies and expectations have been left in huge mess. They can only use now the power of the police or sedate their students with psychotropic meds. It is well known how schools often force parents to put their childern on medications or demand children to be place on programs that are ineffective and of no real benefit. As a last I want to mention the fact that Insurance companies have forced mental health professionals to put children on drugs when in the hospital in order to pay for the care delivered. Therefore, physicians have often been overprescribing when caught between the pressure of the hospitals to want to fill beds andthe insurances refusing to consider as care provided anything else but medications. Moreover, this has had a strong impact on diagnosis given since diagnosis have to be fixed in order to allow payments and to be able to prescribe. Does nybody wonder what is the validity of diagnosis obtained from hospital records? Then they talk of epidemics of mental disorders in children. If a doctor has a child in the hospital and thinks that the child is having problems with his parents he is not allowed to make this diagnosis but has to find a more proper medical looking diagnosis in order for the hospital to be payed and for him to keep his job. Unfortunately, all this has happened in a subtle and silent way without being noticed and with the unspoken approval of the academic and psychiatric professional leadership. Or better, those who notice it are not allowed to speak up within the professional establishment or are dismissed. It is wellknown how there are Bipolar clinics where everybody who enters receives the diagnosis of Bipolar dis and the accompanying/mandated(because the doctor may be sued) prescriptions. The same it is true for the so called ADHD clinics. And what about the maindated requirement to prescribe antidepressant to a child who may be depressed even if the evidence of their benfits is very questionable. and is there no other way to help a depresssed child? And has everybody be necesserely happy? Well, all this may look a little bit too much to you, but I think it needs to be said in the hope that the glasses of pseudoscientific mystique can be dropped and the real problem exposed: when to start to really help children on stop making money out of their misery. Certainly a national debate is needed. Well, what can I say? M aybe isever toolate for this huge problem to be brought up. I am surprised that only few voices are talking about what has been happening to children during the last two years in the USA. The useof medication hs become the standard educational practice and the practice of psychiatry has been reduced to behavioral control. To the reader who says “because they help people” my answer is: “then why to force them? Because this is the reality of the present state of affair. Family are being overtly/covertly convinced/forced to put their children on psychothropic medications and a number of interests are being satisfied in this way. There is no mention of the fact that the vast majority of children’s behavioral and emotional problems are the expression of present sociocultural conditions and there are several factors that have contributed to the medicalization of children’s malaise. One of the most important of them is the fact that psychiatry in the USA came under the control of big business and had to start to fabricate mental illness whenever and wherever possible in order to increase the source of revenues. As for 2006 psychiatric hospitalization acoounted for more than 20% percent of all hoospital stays. Big business found in the pool of children with State Insurances and low socio-economic status a practicllly inexhaustible sorce of psychiatric patients. Hospital became more aggressive in providing care for children and they could use the alibi of need and lack of resources to ask for more money. The psychiatric leadership on the other side saw the possibility of building careers, passing itself as new scientific authority and accumulating huge amounts of money with the support of the Pharmacetical Industry ready to provide the marketing oand the experts for this mass scale operation of misleading and blinding the public.
The reality is that the prescription of medication to children to control their behavior is not based on medical knowledge but is a practice that has been embraced by a decadent society that is witnessing helplessly its breakdown. In no case these medications need to be given to children because they are not treating or curing any disease. Any true physician knows that the problems that children are having are not diseases by any far stretch. These problems have been present in different societies and throughout history and they have beentreated differently. Controlling children’s disturbiing behaviors with drugs is a late fad in the history of mankind that developed in the USA in the last part Of the 20th century. therefore this practice belongs outside the realm of Medicine and in the realm of behavioral and social control.
The breakdown of the families and the ill advised educational policies of the school systems are the two other factors that have strongly contributed to the epidemics of diagnosis in children and to the use of psychotropic. Families have become incresingly permissive and their natural structure has been destryed therefore they have failed in raising healthy children and have lost their control of them. The shools have been unable to engage these children in education and by setting unrealistic policies and expectations have been left in huge mess. They can only use now the power of the police or sedate their students with psychotropic meds. It is well known how schools often force parents to put their childern on medications or demand children to be place on programs that are ineffective and of no real benefit.
As a last I want to mention the fact that Insurance companies have forced mental health professionals to put children on drugs when in the hospital in order to pay for the care delivered. Therefore, physicians have often been overprescribing when caught between the pressure of the hospitals to want to fill beds andthe insurances refusing to consider as care provided anything else but medications. Moreover, this has had a strong impact on diagnosis given since diagnosis have to be fixed in order to allow payments and to be able to prescribe. Does nybody wonder what is the validity of diagnosis obtained from hospital records? Then they talk of epidemics of mental disorders in children. If a doctor has a child in the hospital and thinks that the child is having problems with his parents he is not allowed to make this diagnosis but has to find a more proper medical looking diagnosis in order for the hospital to be payed and for him to keep his job. Unfortunately, all this has happened in a subtle and silent way without being noticed and with the unspoken approval of the academic and psychiatric professional leadership. Or better, those who notice it are not allowed to speak up within the professional establishment or are dismissed. It is wellknown how there are Bipolar clinics where everybody who enters receives the diagnosis of Bipolar dis and the accompanying/mandated(because the doctor may be sued) prescriptions. The same it is true for the so called ADHD clinics. And what about the maindated requirement to prescribe antidepressant to a child who may be depressed even if the evidence of their benfits is very questionable.
and is there no other way to help a depresssed child? And has everybody be necesserely happy?
Well, all this may look a little bit too much to you, but I think it needs to be said in the hope that the glasses of pseudoscientific mystique can be dropped and the real problem exposed: when to start to really help children on stop making money out of their misery.
Certainly a national debate is needed.

]]> By: Steve Parker, M.D. http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/0096/comment-page-1#comment-1991 Steve Parker, M.D. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 15:38:25 +0000 http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/?p=96#comment-1991 I suspect prescription drug use in children is soaring because popping a pill is much easier than getting to the root of the problem. No doubt, the drugs do help some children and their caregivers. I suspect prescription drug use in children is soaring because popping a pill is much easier than getting to the root of the problem.

No doubt, the drugs do help some children and their caregivers.

]]> By: Justin Sedlak, M.D. http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/0096/comment-page-1#comment-1990 Justin Sedlak, M.D. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 14:43:36 +0000 http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/?p=96#comment-1990 They help teachers, because the kids are more docile. They help teachers, because the kids are more docile.

]]> By: Supremacy Claus http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/0096/comment-page-1#comment-1988 Supremacy Claus Tue, 11 Nov 2008 07:32:45 +0000 http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/?p=96#comment-1988 Maybe the use is soaring because they help people. Maybe the use is soaring because they help people.

]]>