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A Million Kids Misdiagnosed with ADHD?
Jamie was one of several people who submitted links to a story proclaiming that as many as a
million kids were misdiagnosed with ADHD simply for being the youngest and therefore least mature in their classes. Worse still, I wonder how many of those kids are permanently put on drugs.
Just let kids be kids?
Can't really say I'm all that surprised. The more responsible/seasoned parents out there pretty much called b.s. on this long ago and actually discipline their kids instead of medicating them.
I presume most of these diagnoses are based on kids simply being kids. They're packed with energy and ready for playtime at a moment's notice. The early years of schooling is/was geared towards training them to control that behavoir. What the heck happened? What's next? Treating restless leg syndrome?*
*Disclaimer: I know no one with this personally, nor do I know if this really, truly is a severe medical condition. I use a pillow between my legs at night if their existence is bothering me.
I have a severely ADHD child- he's not normal, he needs serious drugs to function in school, and he knows it. (He's extremely bright and is fully aware of what he's capable of when he's on them- you ever have to deal with child sobbing because he can't focus on simple tasks?) ADHD is one of the most misunderstood conditions out there- it is real, it can be severe, and we need to avoid knee-jerk "It's all made up" reactions
"Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
When I was a kid, I was always outside running around with friends. Playing by the local pond catching tadpoles, frogs, fish, etc. Playing in the fields catching snakes and bugs while eating raspberries and strawberries. Playing in the woods and streams making dams. Riding our bikes _everywhere_. In the winter we were always outside sledding and having snowball fights. etc. etc. etc.
Why are we expecting kids to sit in one spot for hours on end staring at a teacher/board and expecting them to stay calm and fully attentive? I know school is necessary but that's 7 hours of basically sitting there and then the kids come home and are basically expected to just sit there and do homework and then just sit there and eat dinner. Are we just setting ourselves up for failure? I mean, are we just asking kids to _not_ be kids and then drugging them up to make them comply?
I'm only 30, and frankly I knew of _no_ kids with ADD, let alone ADHD. There were merely kids that liked to sit and read or play quietly and then there were the kids who wanted to play football all the time or otherwise be active.
Seriously, what happened to kids expending their energy? Why do parents/administration expect kids to be these calm and attentive beings who just sit there and want to be talked to all day?
Maybe there are some children who have an imbalance somewhere. It happens. But overall, when a kid wants to run around and play, guess what, they are KIDS! It's part of being a kid. Throwing drugs down their throat to turn them into the kid that is more convenient and calm isn't the answer unless there is a _real_ (read: rare) issue.
This is one of the things that really pisses me off. Why can't we sue them for practicing medicine without a license? They aren't doctors, but they are attempting to force medical prescriptions on children based on their limited knowledge.
Oh, I forgot: "Think of the children"
Similar to the upcoming US election results
A million misdiagnosed just because they're younger? Wait until they start looking into how many kids are misdiagnosed because they're too smart and not being challenged by our schools that are set up to cater to the lowest common denominator.
I was misdiagnosed with ADD as a kid. Turns out, I was just bored out of my fucking skull. Second, third, and fourth grades were the hardest for me because the material should have been covered in one year, not three. Some schools have realized this and starting pulling the smart kids out of 'general population' and putting them in their own curriculum track which is much more challenging.
That's what they should look into
Aero2600
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Infuriate left and right
You also have to consider the doctor has some incentive to cover himself. Given that a diagnoses of ADHD is subjective, a parent convinced that Little Johnny has ADHD is going to continue doctor shopping until they find one that'll make that diagnoses. Probably a lot of doctors figure it's easier to give in and prescribe the drugs than get sued for malpractice by a disgruntled parent.
American Third Position
Finally, a real choice!
Alamazadarnit, your quote illustrates the whole problem. Been there, solved that.
I have Attention problems. I spent about five years semi-scientifically describing its effects down to the activity parsing level.
If someone has ADD, (*Note the missing H - there are multiple variants!), they get called "moron". Getting called "moron" is what makes you depressed. So an SSRI is a total disaster! What's the chief side effect of SSRI's? Lethargic fatigue! So it makes you more of a "moron".
If the guy has ADD, FIX the ADD. Ritalin, Strattera, custom natural cocktails, whatever. But get the guy thinking straight so he isn't called "moron", and watch him magically stop being depressed.
P.S. SSRI side effects are in fact nasty.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
I've had the pleasure of being an outside observer to the therapy and psychiatry world, and you are exactly right from what I've seen and heard. Problem children are problems, parents don't know what to do with them, and they'll go doctor to doctor until they find a solution. Even if that means putting a rowdy child (who just has serious authority issues) on antipsychotics. This problem goes way beyond just ADHD diagnoses; this is just one item in a sea of psychiatry doing what it does best: labelling and providing medication.
-- What did Spock find in Kirk's toilet? The captain's log.
Indeed, I wonder how many supposedly ADHD kids just really need a good thumping to keep them focused.
'Thumping' may be counterproductive.
Personally, I vote for 'More gym time'. Schools that eliminated gym in favor of more classroom hours saw no academic improvement and increases in disruption. Schools that instituted gym time* saw reductions in disruption/discipline issues.
You don't even necessarily need organized gym, you just need to get the kids *MOVING*.
As a result you both need fewer drugged kids, you also have healthier kids.
*Basically exercise. ANY exercise.
I don't read AC A human right
I'm in my 40s so for those of you not old enough to know this, for the past 30 years in the USA, parents, schools and doctors have all been looking for the quick fix for "problem" kids.
In the 1980s psychiatric hospitals were the answer. The kids were all "crazy" and need psychiatric help. Some got put on medication. Some did not. But if you caused a problem anywhere, your butt was going to a psych hospital to get you "help".
In the 1990s, everybody was diagnosed as being hyperactive and put on ritalin.
Roughly since 2000, now the answer is that all kids have ADD or whatever term du jour they use for it. So maybe now instead of getting ritalin you get some other drug, but you're still on medication.
So since the medical community and the schools change their method of treatment and diagnosis every 10 years according to whatever faddish diagnosis takes hold, is it really any wonder that people question whether ADD/ADHD or whatever you call it exists? Because 20+ years ago these same kids were sent to psychiatric hospitals and nobody every said they were "hyperactive" or had "attention deficit disorder". And prior to the 1980s, NOBODY went to psych hospitals or got pumped full of pills for simply being bored.
Look I'm sure that some people really do have ADHD/ADD or whatever they call it and really do need medication for it. But do I think that most kids diagnosed with it have it? Nope.
I mean no disrespect to parents trying to raise a child who legitimately has ADHD or to teachers trying to teach such a child, but the idea of:
1) Segregating students by age
2) Expecting them sit all day
may work for girls, but it doesn't work for boys. I can remember clearly my first grade teacher (in the late 70s) talking with another teacher about which of us were quiet (=good) and which were loud (=bad). And she went through _each student by name as we were forced to listen_. And guess who was good? Nearly all of the girls and a minority of boys, the ones who were quiet by disposition. Why? Because those of us who were normal didn't want to sit still and be quiet all day.
As for age segregation, if boys see older boys modeling good behavior, they tend to do so as well, either because they 'want to grow up to be like them' or they know they'll get smacked if they don't.
Now, take an extreme version of a 'bad' kid coupled with the willingness to drug said kid for the sake of classroom harmony, and you have an obvious explanation for this report.
My daughter's birthday is just shy of the beginning of the school year, making her one of the youngest in her class. In fourth grade her teachers and counselors called me in for a meeting, said it was clear she was ADHD and strongly recommended I get her on Ritalin immediately. I refused. A few months later, another meeting, this time including the vice principal, same forceful recommendation.
Wondering if they were on to something, I took her to a specialist, but when he found out what the issue was, he gave me a questionnaire to fill out, and prescribed Ritalin without ever actually seeing the child. Apparently the medical profession gets a lot of these cases, and they rotate them through as quickly as possible.
This cavalier approach started alarm bells ringing, and I started doing research. As a result, I ended up getting her some *real* help (she is severely dyslexic) and continued to resist efforts by the school system to prescribe drugs for her.
In what turned out to be the final meeting with school offials (sixth grade), I brought in the results from two different specialists and gave an impromptu lecture on dyslexia, it's effects in the classroom, and how this pertains to my child. (Ok, I'm a geek, I probably overprepared.) Eleven expressionless faces looked back at me. When I finished, the principal said "that's all very well, but we are not medical doctors and are not qualified to evaluate this. The school system doesn't recognize dyslexia as a medical condition."
Ok, so let me get this straight. You decline to consider the results from specialists because you're not medical doctors. Yet you have diagnosed my daughter with a neurobehavioral disorder and prescribe drugs for her.
It didn't go well after that, and I pulled her out of school. She was homeschooled for three years and then was accepted into an art magnet school, where she thrives. And her counselors have never, ever, suggested she take Ritalin.
The point is, we're geeks here, we're more likely to have the resources and inclination to dig into the problem and expose this kind of corruption. Dick and Jane, IQ 95 and 97, don't have the wherewithal, and Dick doesn't have time from his backbreaking job at the sprocket plant, and Jane is pretty much incapacitated from her antidepressants, but like any good parents they really do want Dick Junior (IQ 93) to succeed, so when the school says Dickie has a problem and should take these pills...
What's insidious about this is that some kids (about 2%) really do need the drug to function. It's not the drug's fault. What started as relief for a genuine (although somewhat rare) disorder has turned into a huge cash cow.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
I was the little kid who preferred to draw rather than interact, due to being picked on all the time by kids during recess for being small and geeky. So, I was given time release ritalin, which I chewed due to a gag reflex. I literally have no memory of that chunk of my life, save for the occasional bizarre hallucination, and people yelling at me for having nervous tics. I got off it, and suddenly I had friends, I was social, I was doing great in school, and I could actually recollect what had been happening. I'm a grad student now. I can keep up with the schoolwork just fine, and have no issues with focus. According to my mom, who works in neurology now, the company that made Ritalin went around to schools and started giving heavily skewed presentations on ADD and ADHD to teachers, so that the teachers would tell parents that their kids has ADD/ADHD, parents would tell doctors that, doctors would administer a bullshit battery of tests, and kids would do kiddie meth and get stoned.