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Psychopharm Going 'Mainstream' In Schools?
PizzaFace writes "Back in the day, college was a place where a lot of kids tried recreational drugs. Now the world's more competitive, psychopharmaceuticals are better targeted, and millions of students are routinely using drugs to work better and longer. Stimulants developed for attention deficit and narcolepsy are giving mentally healthy students an edge like athletes get from steroids or human growth hormone. These psychotropics seem fairly safe, but should they be banned in the interest of fairness, perhaps with enforcement by urine tests before exams? Or do we tell our kids that, if they want to compete in this brave new world, they better find some Adderall and jack their brains up like their classmates'." If college students are doing it, how many programmers are? What say you?
Step 1: They are getting them from other kids who have a prescription. Step 2: Their parents find out and punish them for taking others' prescription medications. Step 3: Parents find out it will help their kids in school and at home. They convince the doctor to give their kid a prescription. Step 4: PROFIT! Step 5: See Step 1.
Usually from a friend with a prescription. Parents usually have no idea because there are no signs and the kids don't have to go anywhere special to get it.
Why is it that when you believe something it's an opinion, but when I believe something it's a manifesto?
Actually, I think he was referring to DXM containing cough medicine. The kind kids chug/eat to "trip." But yeah, I'd rather see them smoking a little pot. DXM is a little more dangerous.
-matthew
"THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
For those of you thinking about trying this stuff without the supervision of a doctor after reading this: don't. While they can be a godsend for those with ADHD, those who don't have the problem can have some serious trouble.
In non-ADHD subjects, Ritalin and Adderall are similar to methamphetamine in function. In normal individuals, they cause rapid increase in dopamine, just like amphetamines do. Really. If you don't believe me, this article on Ritalin from the National Institute of Health. The upshot of all of this is that in non-ADHD patients, addiction rates are very high due the increased dopamine levels.
Disclosure: my wife is a substance abuse counselor and deals with people addicted to this stuff all the time.
My blog
I would recommend dexadrine. A great drug, this thing is prescribed to kids w/ ADD and special forces pilots often take it as well.
The drug is perfect for studying late:
1) keeps you awake (why special forces likes it)
2) you're not hungry (use to be a diet drug)
3) keeps you focused (why ADD kids get it)
Those three factors are perfect from cramming
Side affects:
1) sometimes you'll end up talking too much
2) can grind your teeth a bit
3) i'm sure there are some health side effects..
"The more you know, the less sure you are." - Voltaire
I bought a pill of adderol once from a friend of mine in my sophomore year at college. I had linear algebra and EM physics finals the next morning. I've never concentrated that hard in my life. I was going from about 11:00pm to 7:00am straight (with regular smoke breaks) at the library, and my linear final was at 7:50. I nailed it too. When I was done studying, my hand was cramped up from all the writing, and my paper felt more like papyrus from all the hand-sweat that was on it.
It's pseudoephedrine. That is, apparantly, one of the primary ingrediants in meth. So they decided that any OTC medication containing pseudoephedrine will no long be something you can simply walk in and buy. You still need no perscription, but you have to go to the pharmacist, fill out a form, have your ID checked, and then you may buy one box only.
Fuck that, too much effort. Next allergy season my doctor has said she'll just write me a 4 month perscription of Allegra.
At any rate, that's the only OTC component I know of that has any regulation. Though people can trip on dextromethorphan, I guess it's rare enough that there's not a serious concern about it. I mean hell, people can get high on whip cream propellant if they want. Pseudoephedrine is just a concer because meth is a rather problematic drug. If it honestly can push meth in to the category of too hard to make, I'm ok with the restriction, but I've a feeling it does nothing but inconcenicence most of us and does not deter the meth heads.
90% of current programmers probably do not use those drugs, since they're overkill for Visual Basic coding...
I wrote Visual Basic code for years, and I took Adderall twice a day. I (or rather my employment status) probably couldn't have survived without it.
There's a common misunderstanding about stimulants like Adderall and Ritalin. They don't make you smarter or faster. They make you able to focus, and they make typically miserable tasks interesting. (Wiring database fields to GUI forms all day is boring, soul-crushing work, but well-paying, challenging jobs don't grow on trees.) They make you feel productive while performing the most menial tasks.
The reason that students take Adderall to cram for exams isn't because it makes you smarter, but because it increases your attention span and allows you to focus on really dry subject matter, so you can study for longer. It also keeps you awake at times when even coffee could not--that, from what I've seen, is the only place where abuse of the drug occurs.
This is anecdotal, but I know a lot of people who took unprescribed Adderall in college. Most of them have never touched any other illicit drugs, but they find the substance useful, and it doesn't seem to cause any harm. I really don't see the rationale for making it illegal for adults without ADD.
Could some of the drug (ab)use in schools and universities be self-medication to some extent?
I just read "The Omega-3 connection" by Andrew Stoll.
Facts:
- Omega-3 fatty acids have therapeutic effects on ADHD and other psychiatric conditions like depression and bipolar disorder (plus non-psychiatric conditions like atherosclerosis too), and they improve learning in animal experiments (there's insufficient research data on children)
- Groups with traditionally high Omega-3 (i.e. fish) intake (Inuit, some Japanese populations) have virtually none of those conditions
- The average American diet has only about a tenth of the Omega-3 intake that is considered healthy by nutritionists
- The body holds on to Omega-3s tenaciously, over years. A baby's initial Omega-3 store comes 100% from the mother. This may cause Omega-3 levels to decline over generations. And, OBTW, post-partum (after pregnancy) depression is rising steeply, so one hypothesis is that pregnancy depletes the mother's body of Omega-3s if she doesn't have enough. And (drum roll...) children that were bottle-fed have a signficantly higher rate of cognitive/learning issues like ADHD etc. Baby formula supplemented with Omega-3s has only been available in the US since 2002 or so, so the jury is still out on the effects.
Pretty convincing research IMHO.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
The short answer is that a corporation doesn't make a profit on pot. Corporations do make a profit in opposing pot.
It was because of some businesses and wealthy people that hemp, aka marijuana, was made illegal to begin with. Prior to it being made illegal Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence on hemp paper. As a farmer he grew hemp on his estate and once wrote that he thought farmers should be required to grow hemp, he never did follow through with this because he knew such a law would be denying farmers the right to grow what they wanted. Rudolph Diesel designed his engine to run on most any vegeble oil including hemp oil. And on his Iron Mountain Estate, Henry Ford designed and built a vehicle that used hemp in the manufacture of it and was powered by fuel made from hemp. It was because of the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 that hemp was made illegal. Several powerful people had pushed congress to have hemp made illegal because they saw it as a threat to their wealth. But even after made illegal the US government encouraged farmers to grow hemp during WWII. They went so far as to make a movie, "Hemp for Victory" to encourage farmers to grow it.
FalconShould there be a Law?
This sounds a bit corny, and is so out of place on Slashdot that it isn't even funny, but I've found being physically active (like at least 30 mins exercise a day) and maintaining a healthy lifestyle does good things to your concentration and studying abilities. You'll be less tired because your lung capacity improves and more, and there's of course other good side effects beyond the realms of studies, like better looks and health. Many feel they're too tired to exercise, but that's a bit of a vicious cycle in that the reason is often because you haven't.
:-)
So this would be a natural way to hopefully improve the studying situation a bit if you're into that sort of thing.
OK, so I've done it. Posted a health/lifestyle post on Slashdot. Feel free to mod me into oblivion!
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
I've personally known a person, who was addicted to pscychopharmaca and was buying this stuff for half of her income. She looked like a zombie or a droggie. The worst looking person I had direct contact with. She died two years ago at the age around 47. It was better to end it for her and for everybody else. This stuff ( Ritalin, Prozac, Zoloft, ... ) can have long term side effects.
And how do you prove, that your late liver damage or mental problems are not coming from these drugs taken maybe years ago?
FWIW, the definition of genius is an IQ of over 140, and ranks at about the top 1/2 percentile. If you have an IQ of 161 and that isn't first string, just what league are you playing in?
The confusion is that the schedules were designed for the "War n Drugs". Before 1970 and the controlled substance act, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_Substance
Only congress can pass new laws (in theory). And drug laws need strict definitions. As in, this particular molecular structure know as "XYZ" is illegal. Change the molecular structure and the new substance is not illegal. Every time a new designer drug was developed, congress would have to go through the process of creating a new law making that new substance illegal.
Nixon changed all that. He gave the Department of Justice and the Department of Health and Human Services (which includes the Food and Drug Administration) power to create new law in what some call a side step around the Constitution.
Congress defined 5 categories of drugs. They also control the legality of each category. However, the categorization of a substance falls to the Justice Department and FDA. Now, a new designer drug comes out and the FDA is charged with categorizing it. They make it a Schedule 1. Wa-La, a new chemical becomes illegal. Some see this as a side step around the Consultation because it gives, in effect, the FDA law making powers reserved in the Constitution for Congress.
So the Schedules are less about science than politics. That's why a commercial drug from a powerful drug company with lots of lobby money gets fentanyl on schedule 2 even though it's more powerful than heroin on schedule 1. As if heroin has absolutely no medical value (profit) but fentanyl does?
Obligatory slashdot quote: They must be new here (to the USA).
-[d]-
10 million kids with the taste of speed in their mouths. Does that not scare anyone else?
Not particularly.
I think that you're overstating the case to say that Ritalin is speed. Ritalin has a much slower onset, and therefore is not as reinforcing. Kids with genuine ADD actually tend to feel "better" off of the drug, and ADD kids who were treated with Ritalin prove less likely to abuse illegal drugs later in life than those left untreated. Ritalin has been researched and reviewed more than almost any other drug, and found to be safe and effective.
What's also hard to appreciate is the fact that such drugs affect different people differently. Some people do get a rush from taking Ritalin, particularly if they insuffulate it. Some feel simply calmed. Some feel anxious. It's not uniformly a euphoriant or even reliably performance enhancing. It all depends on the brain chemistry of the user.
The problem with every psychotropic drug (or any prescription drug) is that there will always be some people who are incorrectly diagnosed, and medicated needlessly. I don't doubt that there are kids who have something other than ADD, but who were hastily diagnosed by a doctor under duress from their parents, or simply because they're poor doctors. It's not the drugs that are bad, however, it's the doctors.
Ritalin can be a godsend for someone who really needs it, such as myself. Without it, I often find myself locked out of my own brain, unable to initiate or sustain a train of thought. My brain does what it wants, and I'm at its whim. With it, I am able to simply think and have control over what I think about. Not better or faster or happier, just normally, like everyone else can. Whether it's natural or right or whatever isn't of concern to me. Humans have learned to manipulate chemistry to our advantage, and we'll continue to do so. It's simply another tool.
Adderall days I accomplish 2-3 days worth of non-adderall work. You are like a machine. I can work for 12 hours without eating or drinking. Whatever you point your brain at becomes so engrossing that just nothing else matters, and you can point it at anything at all.
It often makes me wonder if there are other people that can switch into something like that naturally (maybe I have slight ADD myself? or maybe it's bs and the difference is I was forced to learn to calm myself down and focus on something, where others weren't?). Maybe all that seperated average joe from 1337 scientist was he was capable of focusing like that.
I also couldn't imagine being like that all the time. I couldn't be like that everyday; after one I feel mentally exhausted.
Adderall is what caffeine wanted to be. The downside for me is that I don't really enjoy caffeine anymore. It makes you jittery and prevents you from being tired, more than it actually increases the quality of the time you are on it.