Slashdot Mirror
The Business of Attention Deficit Disorder
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Alan Schwarz writes in the NYT that the rise of ADHD diagnoses and prescriptions for stimulants over the years have coincided with a remarkably successful two-decade campaign by pharmaceutical companies to publicize the syndrome and promote the pills to doctors, educators and parents. 'The numbers make it look like an epidemic. Well, it's not. It's preposterous,' says Dr. Keith Conners, a psychologist who has led the fight to legitimize attention deficit hyperactivity disorder for more than fifty years. Few dispute that classic ADHD, historically estimated to affect 5 percent of children, is a legitimate disability that impedes success at school, work and personal life. But recent data from the CDC show that the diagnosis had been made in 15 percent of high school-age children, and that the number of children on medication for the disorder had soared to 3.5 million from 600,000 in 1990." (Read on for more.)
"Behind that growth has been drug company marketing that has stretched the image of classic ADHD to include relatively normal behavior like carelessness and impatience, and has often overstated the pills' benefits. Advertising on television and in popular magazines like People and Good Housekeeping has cast common childhood forgetfulness and poor grades as grounds for medication that, among other benefits, can result in 'schoolwork that matches his intelligence' and ease family tension. The FDA has cited every major ADHD drug — stimulants like Adderall, Concerta, Focalin and Vyvanse, and nonstimulants like Intuniv and Strattera — for false and misleading advertising since 2000, some multiple times. And although many doctors have portrayed the medications as benign — 'safer than aspirin,' some say — they can have significant side effects and are regulated in the same class as morphine and oxycodone because of their potential for abuse and addiction. Meanwhile profits for the ADHD drug industry have soared. Sales of stimulant medication in 2012 were nearly $9 billion, more than five times the $1.7 billion a decade before, according to the data company IMS Health. 'This is a concoction to justify the giving out of medication at unprecedented and unjustifiable levels,' concludes Conners."
Wait... what was I doing?
The pharmaceutical industry won't be happy until everyone is on a handful of medications. One that supposedly "cures what ails you" and the rest to address the many side effects of the other drugs.
Get 'em early. Get 'em hooked. Get 'em for life.
See also https://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html . Watching that video will be one of the best 20 minutes you've ever spent.
The ACA is something, and something is better than nothing, but the medical industry is saturated with greed and gouging. Take the obscene profits out of medical care and there is no incentive for mass misdiagnosis.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Is it big pharma pushing doctors to prescribe more? Is it doctors too lazy/busy to do a proper diagnosis? Is it mothers, fathers and teachers who seek to explain bad behavior and poor discipline (which is largely their fault) on medical conditions? Is it our foods which have changed over to GMO based content over the same period of time?
I don't know, but I certainly want to know.
In the mean time, I tend to stick to basic foods to avoid as much problem as I can. Most dinners consist of salad and some kind of meat or fish and some other vegetables. Lunch is usually the same and breakfast is eggs, sausage or bacon and garden vegetables. Not much room for GMOs to creep in yet unless you count the feed that goes into the animals.
...aside from the big push by the drug companies is that they allow family doctors to diagnose ADHD and prescribe the meds at all. The docs, parents, and teachers get handed a checklist and if the kid (or adult) meets a certain number of criteria on the checklist then they're told meds are the answer. Some doctors who work for the big PPOs and HMOs are expected to see 6 or more patients an hour so they are taught to rely on the checklists to give them answers. Sometimes it comes down to the fact that a few parents and teachers have lost the ability to set and hold limits with their kids. Sometimes a kid is just being a brat. I'm simplifying so I'm hoping someone can expand on my idea more, but ADHD is serious and needs to be diagnosed by a psychiatrist. Attention problems and hyperactivity can be symptoms of things other than ADHD too.
I did a quick search to see how many children there are in the United State. The first number I found was 74 million (total of all children under 18, as of 2013).
5% of 74 million is 3.7 million. Since I doubt they are giving Ritalin to toddlers (yet), this estimated number of children with ADHD is amazing close to the number who are on a prescription.
In other words, those are probably not two independently-derived numbers. They're one. There is no independent estimate of what percentage of kids have ADHD: there's only a count of how many are on the meds. This is a classic trick from _How to Lie with Statistics_: when you don't have the number you want (how many kids actually have ADHD), use the number you have (how many are on the meds) and pretend there is no distinction.
This has the side effect of "showing" (with numbers!) that the diagnostic methods for ADHD are nearly perfect. By circular logic, QED.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
... is marijuana. Big Pharma pills = poison that makes you even sicker (and poorer).
While I agree that true ADD is out there. The levels of diagnoses are high because parents are willing to pay to have their child diagnoses with it. I have dyslexia - I dispute have a BA in History - have no scent of letters = sounds. So I was placed in a class with 7 other students - in a public school in Ontario. 3 of the other children had ADD - you could tell if they didn't take their drugs - heck you could tell in one class when one the kids Mom's was refusing to take hers. They were more emotional; fiddled with everything and distracted. Sending them out to run around did not help because it clearly wasn't that type of energy. On the drugs then tend to way to forced; prone to only looking at the details and fussy. Either way not the most fun people.
I thing we as a society have bought into our own fansitys too much some people do not do well in school; in the office or on a factory line but are much better with outside world.
an under-informed patient"
(or something to that effect)
Apologies to Dr Knock.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
I'm not american, lived and visited several parts of the world. Love to talk and fit in with the locals and socialize.
Of course it's all anecdotal, but I'm pretty sure that something odd is going on in American culture. The times i've been there I couldn't help but finding amazing how such large parts of the population take behavioral related medication. I mean, even most TV commercials I saw were for anti depressants, or even complenents to them.
But it's not the medication itself what caught my attention but how people itself claims to be unwell, not feeling like what people should feel or not behaving as people should behave. It's as if there was some sort of strong "need to be normal" or "need to be well" (whathever tha means), and that not being like that is not fitting in society.
It's not that where I am from (South America) people won't get depressed or have panic attacks, but you see such symptoms by far much, much less often. It's not misdiagnose either or that people chooses to put up with it instead of taking medication , I mean, it's very clear when someone is going through depression. In contrast, people here are more "unpolite", intimate,cares less about rules and socialize a lot more. I'm sure there has to be a relationship somehow, but I am no expert on the matter. As I said, it's just what I see, but I can't connect the dots.
So, I think that even if pharmaceutical companies capitalize on this stuff, I'm not that sure they created the situation, I believe it's more akin to a side-effect.
I can't help agree with a poster above, who recommended the Ken Robinson video.
I also wanted to add that I think the way that our modern education system works has a lot to do with parents seeking a diagnosis for little Bobby "who just can't sit still".
I used to work in the environmental education field for quite a few years. I can say that I loved to have kids with "ADHD" in my group, because they were the ones turning over rocks and logs and activity searching for things. What is seen as a detriment in one setting, seemed to be an advantage in another setting.
An interesting thing to note is often how I would find out about their conditions. Since I did do some work at overnight facilities, I would sometimes would be told ahead of time medications and conditions a child had. But most of the time, I found out about it by a teacher saying something like: You know, so-and-so has a ADD/ADHD and he is just doing SO well out here.
I have ADD myself, and I take meds to treat it. I can honestly say that I make smarter decisions when on my medications. I focus better, get things done, my social life improves, and I'm just generally better at living. And when I reflect back on days when I was not on my meds, I often just shake my head at myself in embarassment for all the dumb things I did that day. So glad to have a treatment. I think before ADD was clinically diagnosed, people were just called "less intelligent". And who wants to be dumb? Certainly not me.
If they have truly made a pill for carelessness and impatience, imagine how many factors more richer they could be if they made a pill to cure idiocy.
Adult Discipline Deficiency... a better de-acronymization. Way too many diagnosed with ADD don't need medication, they just need boundaries and discipline.
"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." -- H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) --
A lot of the objection seems to be that there is a force promoting the life long use of the drugs..
Consider insulin. Do you have an objection to taking this all your life if you're diabetic?
Consider non-drowsy antihistamines (Seldane, Claritin, etc.)
Back before those were invented, people with allergic rhinitis had three choices:
1) live with perpetually congested noses
2) identify the allergen and go through a series of desensitization shots, that may or may not work, and aren't available for all allergens (e.g. cats)
3) take drowsy antihistimines (Actifed, for instance).
(I guess you could try and create an allergen free environment.. or keep moving to areas with different vegetation)
Now that the newer drugs exist, a person can take them, and there's no particular reason why they shouldn't take them for the rest of their life (or at least until the allergy goes away.. some do).
Is this a bad thing? You take a drug that counteracts a problem with your biochemistry that is largely a genetic thing (you have IgE).
There's no doubt that ADHD can be misdiagnosed, particularly because the drugs have desirable effects (the black market trade in stimulants at schools is quite active and large).
However, why would you object to anyone taking it. Is taking a stimulant somehow morally wrong? Or is it some sort of "cheating" to allow you to do more with what you were born with? Is drinking redbull, or coffee, or whatever somehow different, just because of the non-prescription nature of it.
Lots of comments about how little Johnny is being drugged so they sit quietly, and that this is somehow evil, and we should let Johnny express his true nature. Is this some sort of throwback to Rousseau's noble savage: that somehow things in nature are *better* than things that are artificial in some way.
I think that as long there's informed consent, let people use what drugs they want, with an awareness of the side-effects. (this *is* the problem, though.. the drug companies have a huge incentive to market the good, and minimize the bad... Better test scores, more productive at work, die sooner)
TL
I've got ADD. I was diagnosed with it in 5th grade. My parents refused medications and instead demanded the school address it via teaching techniques. Right or wrong that decision lead to me being who I am. They used to tell me in my special ed class that I was the only one in there that actually had ADD, the rest were just lazy. lol. It does bother me how many people I meet that claim to have ADD and clearly do not. Just about everyone self diagnoses themselves with it at a whim. It's not a joke, it's a real and debilitating disease.
My teachers taught me how to focus despite my disability. Today's shrinks (at least the ones I see) call it "Hyper focus" which has it's pluses and negatives. I can be given a task and plow through it in an almost machine like manner. I could be at a rock concert, it doesn't matter. If the planes going down and you need someone to work on fixing the autopilot before we crash without being distracted by imminent death and everyone screaming, I'm your man. I'd still be stripping wires as we plowed into the ground.
The downside is, I'm not in many plane crashes or doing work at rock concerts so often. More routinely I'm at my desk focused on some code or SQL, and I miss a fire drill... or someone comes up to me, needs my attention and keeps bugging me until I finally turn around in a rage and say WHAT?!?!?!? then feel very embarrassed. Luckily I've explained my condition and my co-workers understand why it happens. Like any mental health condition it becomes a lot easier to deal with when you have a shrink give you tools that you can teach to those around you. Now my friends and co-workers know there is value in me being a bit off and put up with me getting cranky when torn away from my work. They also tap me on the shoulder for fire alarms now. :-)
And, I always like to state that being open about mental health issues is good. We need to stop shunning people who have them... We ALL have them.
Because TV is not working any more to keep them busy while we don't want to care for them!
A number of years back I used to dial-surf while driving, and often I'd come across the local Christian (mainstream Protestant really) radio station. One thing I remember noticing was the tremendous number of ads and special segments involving ADD and ADHD diagnoses and treatment for kids.
Now, in retrospect, it's possible that the station was sponsored in part by some pharma company. But my only guess at the time was that if you were a parent raising your child in as Biblical a way as possible, but your child was nevertheless inattentive and rebellious, then you might look for some medical reason to explain the disconnect.
We all want explanations for why our lives aren't going the way we want them to, despite our best efforts. Some people take solace in religion, some in science, and some in a combination of both.
Koans and fables for the software engineer
It seems to be the diagnosis d'jour. When I was diagnosed I went through hours of cognitive and psychological assessments at a University clinic, face to face interviews, and a counselor who was so worried about me that she wanted me to immediately check myself into a mental ward. SInce I have moved around and changed insurance companies I have changed doctors several times. When I walk into their office it is more along the lines of a one page self assessment check list. A joke. You should not accept the diagnosis with out going through interviews and tests along the same complexity and comprehensiveness I had.
....and she mentioned that they had an elderly woman come in for a doctor's visit.
As usual, the woman was told to bring her current medications, so they could make sure about what she was taking, cross reactions, etc.
She came empty handed. The doctor proceeded to gently explain to her (right away) about why it was so important to bring them while the whole time she tried to explain: she doesn't TAKE any meds.
His reply was an astonished, "At all?"
Eventually she got through to this (young) doctor that no, despite being 74 years old, she was on NO ongoing medications, except the occasional aspirin for when she had a headache.
It was this nurse's impression that the doctor was a) disbelieving, and b) absolutely determined that this woman MUST have some sort of undiagnosed malady that she wasn't being treated for. They tested her all over the place - no diabetes (but rather high blood sugar...she said she'd just had coffeecake that morning), high-ish blood pressure but nothing needing treatment, etc. She was just a normal, healthy old person.
-Styopa
When I was a child I simply could not stand doing _nothing_. My mom would make me wait around in the lobby for my older brother to get out of his swimming class for about 40 minutes 3 times a week and I remember vividly that I found those days to be some kind of torture. My mom would get furious that I couldn't just sit on the damn chair and read a stupid magazine silently.
The way I behaved during those 40 minutes the 3 times a week would probably qualify me for the meds they are prescribing for kids these days. Yet not only did I have no trouble concentrating, but I was on the top of my class back on those days. I have to say that most of these cases are probably about kids not being engaged in the education system. If a kid finds listening to the teacher while he tries to shove some random knowledge on the kids brain boring they will start behaving like I did while waiting on the lobby, it's natural since the alternative is to do nothing. Nothing is worse for a child than doing nothing.
It's more about engagement than concentration deficits.
Just like food isn't a treat, but you still have to keep paying for more food for the rest of your life.
You need to be a little more discriminating of what is being said.
Unless you like looking dumber than a sack of spanners.
Few dispute that classic ADHD, historically estimated to affect 5 percent of children, is a legitimate disability that impedes success at school, work and personal life. But recent data from the CDC show that the diagnosis had been made in 15 percent of high school-age children, and that the number of children on medication for the disorder had soared to 3.5 million from 600,000 in 1990."
According to this census data there are 62.3 million School aged children in the US, Five percent of that is 3.1 Million. The numbers don't seem so far off. Even the 5% may be off as diagnostic criteria changes over time. It may be higher now.
Even including tax rate excess over the USA, if all that tax were paying for healthcare, Scandanavia WOULD STILL BE A HELL OF A LOT CHEAPER.
However, not all that excess tax is paying for healthcare, so if you merely implemented the SAME healthcare as Scandanavia, you would be paying more tax and much less on healthcare.
This, however, does not gel with your ideology so will be blanked out of reality forthwith.
I've seen many claim that these medicines are turning kids into zombies. It gets tied with the issue of misdiagnosis.
My question is... If these medications are stimulants, doesn't "zombification" mean a correct diagnosis which needs a dosage adjustment? After all if the kid doesn't have the problem then wouldn't stimulants make then more active? Coffee calms me down but has the opposite effect on others. Shouldn't it be obvious if a kid is wrongly given stimulants?
Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
Or is the chemistry of food somehow different from the chemistry of anything else?
Flavoured electrons, maybe?
"non-profit" hospitals abound in the U.S, yet they still charge almost the exact same rates as your evil "for-profit" ones.
Non-profit doesn't mean the organization does not intend to make a profit. It means the organization does not pay the profit out to shareholders but instead are obligated to plow them back into furthering the goals of the organization.
That’s a 26-percent profit margin, unheard of in any service industry other than hospitals.
The typical operating profit margin for hospitals is quite a bit lower that that - more like 3%. If those numbers you cited are accurate they are an exceptional performance compared to most. You see 25%+ profit margins in biotech and pharmaceuticals but margins for health care facilities (like hospitals) tend to be around 3%-6% in most cases. MD Anderson specializes in advanced cancer treatment so they are kind of an unusual case to begin with.
MadInAmerica.com has many posts about how Big Pharma has marketed its products.
Kids who now have ADHD used to be called a-bit-of-a-hand-full or vivacious or blustering or some other endearing term. Sure, there were times where you'd get annoyed by the pestering "brutes". But then they would show their unexpected lovable side and everything was fine once more. You"d deal with them and they would with you. Both became better in accepting different characters.
Nowadays we define norms and anything outside of them will be therapeuted away. I say let kids be without protection that eventually will drop away from them. Let them learn how to deal with themselves and be there when they need you.
I hadn't the slightest objection to his spending his time planning massacres for the bourgeoisie... (P.G. Wodehouse)
What's needed is less government intervention and more people shopping for normal health care to help drive down the costs.
That is nothing more than bald ideological nonsense in soundbite form with no actual details. The government HAS to be involved in medical care because the normal market forces do not work especially well. People are buying a product they don't understand well, from vendors who are very sophisticated, where it is typically paid for by someone else (insurance usually), and for which the customer (us) is in a very poor negotiating position (pay up or suffer/die). EVERYONE consumes health care and the only organization in a position to keep people from getting ripped off is the government. I don't have any great love of government but it serves a necessary role for some problems and public health happens to be one of them. There is not a single industrialized country on earth where the government does not play a very significant role in the health care industry. The notion that you are going to solve that problem by "less government intervention" (a meaningless soundbite) is frankly ridiculous. Let's hear your master plan for how market forces are magically going to come to the rescue if only the government would get out of the way.
Of course the typical collectivist response to this is "OMG you can't shop around when you're bleeding to death." Which is nothing but a straw man, because emergency and trauma care is a much smaller proportion.
It demonstrably is not a straw man. 50% of hospital admissions come through the Emergency Department. If you think that is a tiny portion of hospital revenue then you are delusional.
Even shopping around for the best price on a procedure would put tremendous amount of price pressure on the providers if more people did it.
That would be true if people were well educated consumers or if they had the ability or willingness to shop around. Unfortunately most people have an poor grasp of the nuances in treatment options or what constitutes a fair price. Many simply aren't interested in shopping around. When people are ill, they go to get treated to feel better. If you claim that you are going to go price shopping when you have an infection or nausea or a wound in need of prompt treatment, I'm going to call you a liar. Furthermore many people want to deal with a specific doctor that they trust and are unwilling to go price shopping even when it is an option.
I am 34 and have been on Adderal for about six years now. Being on this medication has had such an improvement on my life that I really wish I had been on it at a much younger age - especially in high school.
The problem that I have is that ADD/ADHD is that it is a classification of a symptom, but does not define the root cause. I also have dyslexia. After doing research into the characteristics of dyslexia, I believe that is really what my source of ADD symptoms is. What I have found is that I need to be stimulated in order to have functional cognitive capacity. When stimulated, I am generally well above average in cognitive capabilities. When non-stimulated, my brain simply shuts down. Stimulation can come from several sources: Medication, exercise, and engaging in an activity that I find interesting.
In an ideal world I would not use medication, but instead stick to exercise and activities I enjoy. I unfortunately live in a world of rigid school structuring designed to prepare students for a similar corporate environment. I have learned to cope with the corporate environment by reducing as much of the TPS reporting from my job description as possible, and standing most of the day. I have a standing desk, and in almost every meeting you find me at, I will be in the back standing or slowly pacing. I loathe wasteful meetings, and avoid them when possible.
I personally think that we need to re-evaluate our education system with the thought that there might not be a one size fits all solution. Take all the kids who have "ADD" and put them in a separate school, and figure out what kind of curriculum works best for them. That might sound like the worst nightmare of a teacher, but I believe that with a proper engagement, you'd end up with a school full of superstars.
...it all goes to companies that sell things to supe-up my PC and car so I don't have to wait and my attention span doesn't run out. Problem solved!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
All of these 'OMGZ PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANIES AND THEIR DRUG PUSHING MAN' assholes don't have the slightest fucking clue about ADHD, or neuropsychiatry in general.
I say to those assholes: do some proper reading on the subject and stop spraying your stupid 'CORPORATIONS MAN' hipster piss everywhere. When I say 'proper reading', I don't mean typing 'IS ADHD REAL?' into Google and clicking on the first shitty alternative medicine site you find in the results, but rather reading proper studies in proper neurology/neuropsychiatry journals (not extracts either - find someone who will let you borrow their accounts and read the full texts).
Why should ADHD be discounted as a real disorder just because it can't be physically diagnosed in living patients with current diagnostic equipment and techniques? Parkinson's can't be diagnosed in living patients right now either, but you don't hear the anti-pharma quacks whining about that one (e.g. 'LOL THEY ARE JUST SLOW, CLUMSY AND HAVE THE DTs ITS JUST A MADE UP DISEASE INVENTED TO SELL LDOPA AND DOPAMINE AGONISTS MAN'). People used to believe that microorganisms were imaginary, just because they couldn't see them, but infections still existed. Just because a neurological disorder isn't visible on a PD/T2W/FLAIR, isn't observable on an fMRI, doesn't have well-known genetic causes, and doesn't cause any changes outside of the brain, that doesn't make it any less real.
The exact cause of ADHD may not be known for sure yet (e.g. dopaminergic vs glutaminergic vs a combination of the two vs something completely different that influences those things, specific combinations of specific variations of specific genes, etc), but ADHD certainly does exist.
I have ADHD-PI (aka ADD, which ADHD deniers would probably call the 'lazy' type), and I can tell you that it is NOT laziness, bad behaviour, nor is it 'NATURAL BEHAVIOUR MAN' - it is a debilitating set of cognitive dysfunctions that absolutely destroy your ability to organise your thoughts (not in a schizophrenic way where the thoughts themselves are jumbled though - the thoughts are coherent, but there are so many internal and external distractions that you can't follow a train of thought, and it feels like you're in a fog) or focus your effort when doing difficult tasks.
I suffered through failure after failure, dropped out of school, couldn't keep a job, couldn't accomplish any of my goals, and went on to develop severe depression/anxiety. It's only since being diagnosed with ADHD, being on stimulants (in low doses, of course, because as anyone who actually has ADHD will tell you, less is more, and too much just zones you out) and having extensive therapy to sort out the bad habits I've developed as a result of growing up with untreated ADHD (by far the worst aspect of ADHD, and one that can be easily prevented by treating from an early age instead of ignoring the problem or writing it off as 'bad behaviour'), that I have been able to start living my life
Anyway, in short: ADHD is real, and people who say otherwise, even in ignorance, are just stupid.
Seems like everyone is on some kind of happy/dopy drug these days. And, is it me, or has the workplace changed significantly as a result? Seems like way too many people are walking around today smiling and happy all the time for no fucking reason. Not that I'm a grinch or anything, but it seems like a "positive attitude" these days has lost its classical meaning of a "can-do attitude" and has taken on more the flavor of a "happy, happy all the time" attitude. I'm starting to feel like a freak for not walking around as happy as a goddamn Barney the Dinosaur 24/7. I raise a single objection or broach the slightest criticism and suddenly I'm a cynic, with a bunch of endlessly smiling freaks staring at me like *I'm* the one who's crazy for not being endlessly doped up and "positive."
Yes, precisely. And this is why the government's new "War On Happiness" is both necessary and vital to the security of our nation. Face it, it's just not normal to be so happy all the time, you know it's not. Which is why I fully support the criminalization of happiness, and you should, too! Frankly, I never did trust all those smiling faces... It's time to throw them all* in prison where they belong!
*following precedent, the new rules apply to the masses only, not applicable to the 1%.
A bunch of armchair physicians who dispensing advice like "in my day, they were just hyper and we would cuff them a good one upside the head until they behaved, now they called it some fancy shmancy thing and give them a medication" or "bah, send them outside for some exercise"... And then there's the people who are themselves or have kids who have been diagnosed ... I know we've had my son assessed and were hoping for a negative diagnosis... Unfortunately, the testing showed that he does have the inattentive variety which we are not treating with medication but a lot of hard work on our part, the part of his teachers, and on his part... As a side effect, he is also gifted so we got him into a local school full of teachers who understand how to deal with this... It's been a life changer. With the proper support, he is flourishing... Don't get me wrong, it's still occasionally infuriating and he has his occasional failures... He can't remember from one minute to the next what he's supposed to be doing, and time passes without him even realizing so he is perpetually late for appointments or classes... But he's also nothing short of brilliant and someone I can turn to when I need a creative solution to a problem...
Our only question is whether he could really benefit from taking the medication or whether he's better off learning how to cope without it... The pediatricians have left it up to us...
Around third grade, the school diagnosed my daughter with ADHD. Not knowing any better, I talked to her GP, who recommended a psychiatrist. A few days later, we all went to see the psych. He did not interact with my daughter at all, just gave my wife and I each a questionnaire to fill out. We came to the second appointment with questionnaires filled out, again with our daughter. He again did not interact with her in any way, and she fell asleep on the couch while we were talking. He scored the tests, and announced that she was borderline ADHD. He went into another room and came back with some drug literature, saying we had a choice of this kind or that kind of Ritalin. I tried to drill down a little, asking what he was basing his diagnosis on, and whether he was at any time going to test the child himself. But he made it clear that this was the extent of the service he provided.
It's an assembly line, with each person acting as a well oiled component to move you along the process. The school teachers zero in on any kid that's not absolutely fitting in or absolutely attentive. The GPs get these requests frequently, and point the parents at the specialist, who makes his diagnosis based on a questionnaire that has questions like "does your child like to climb?" (a) never, (b) sometimes (c) frequently. The insurance pays for most of it -- there's only a minor copay for the doctor visits and for the medication.
I revolted, got a second opinion, got a completely different answer. Some easy tests -- done with the actual child, not just depending on the parents' opinion, got to the root of the problem -- my daughter was severely dyslexic. I put her through a summer of tests and remedial training on my own dime, took the inch thick findings to the next parent/teacher conference, was told that -- I swear I am not making this up -- the school didn't recognize dyslexia as an affliction, and that my daughter would be so much happier on Ritalin, "my son takes it, and he is doing so much better with his life". I'd hear this a lot from school teachers and admins -- that they invariably had a son or daughter or niece who's life was changed by Ritalin.
I continued to research, and the more I read the more it looked like Ritalin really did help certain kids, but it was overprescribed by a factor of three or four depending on which study you believed.
The school made it clear that this was the only solution they would consider.
I pulled her out of school. This caused quite a furor and I had to justify my decision in front of eleven people -- counselors, teachers, principal... it was a tense meeting. I summarized it thus: "Each of you have a report in front of you by actual doctors, on their findings on my daughter's affliction. They have diagnosed my daughter as severely dyslexic. You have diagnosed her as ADHD. Are you doctors?" Silence. She was homeschooled for three years, then applied and was accepted into an art magnet school. Completely different environment, and she thrived.
Your mileage, as always, may vary, and not all school systems are alike, but in ours, there seemed to be a huge push to put as many kids on the drug as possible. I always wondered what some sleuthing would turn up regarding donations made by drug manufacturers.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
The ultimate poison being fluoridated drinking water/toothpaste/fumigants. Almost 70% of American currently being poisoned via their tap water. Let's see...(1) poison everybody, (2) make symptom-masking drugs, (3) oh yeah, profit.
When I was a kid I had to go to Sunday school. There I was the worst fidget in the history of fidgets. Around age 10 or 12, I don't remember exactly, I was allowed to opt out. Went hand logging with my father instead. I was cured!
Maybe half of ADHD is just the mind-numbing boredom of school, when compared to today's video games/YouTubes/athletics/music/etc. A problem I call "tasting the ice cream". You don't have any problems getting your kids to eat all kinds of healthy things...until they taste ice cream.
I come here for the love
Either you didn't read the article you linked to, or you're lying about its content. It doesn't support your bullshit claims.
or you could end up bankrupt because your daughter was unfortunate enough to get leukemia while you were between jobs...or you could have got a real health care system...like Germany, Taiwan, United Kingdom, France, Brazil, Argentina, Canada, Japan, Italy.....all without spending what americans did to provide the "best" healthcare to 4/5ths of is population.
Perhaps the reason for the high percentage of children on stimulant medication is due to the ability of the medication to improve concentration in those who do not have ADD/ADHD. Suppose a child is simply uninterested in schooling, and as a result are diagnosed with one of these disorders. The stimulant effects of the medication prescribed then increases their desire to concentrate and ability to remain focused for prolonged periods of time, beyond the normal period of time an unmedicated child could remain focused. The resulting increase in achievement surpassing that which the child would have naturally reached is then heralded as another successful diagnosis, and other children showing similar behavior are also misdiagnosed with these disorders by the same doctor in future.
It's not that you have ADD, it's that...LOOK! A SQUIRREL!
"Once we've identified and embraced our sickness, we'll have strength...and that's when we get dangerous." - John Waters
Lifetime consumer of Seldane, then Claritin. And thankful for it.
The real issue is side effects and informed consent. The *theory* is that the MD prescribing is aware of the side effects and will prescribe appropriately.
On the other hand, side effects may not be known: thalidomide, fen-phen, seldane
Is the casual consumer going to spend the time, and have the expertise to evaluate this kind of thing. The existing process may not be optimal, and I think there should be more disclosure all around. However, I don't want to have to become a pharmacology expert, either, and I'd like to *trust* my advisor.
I have joked that I am "suffering" from ADD 2: I don't have much of a problem paying attention, but, if I don't get enough attention, I get disorderly.
I wonder if a lot of the "false positives" are actually cause by what I call "Audience Deficit Disorder", something I have-- and my dad did. Nothing else really accounts for how desperate I get for a laugh.
Given familial structures these days, I suspect a lot of adolescents feel a distinct lack of attention-- much less approval-- within their family of origin.
Another little point on the curve I have noticed is that, with anti-depressants given out like candy, perhaps it is not the people who are defective but the culture they live within.
Beware mistaking correlation for causation.
Seriously, when I hear conspiracy theory crap like this, even if it's true, you've still got to tell me what the harm is if more people have access to treatment, even though some of them might not need it. It's the same with autism diagnosis: they favor the diagnosis over not giving it because it allow the child access to therapy which can significantly improve outcomes. If you're going to err, overdiagnosis for these disorders is a reasonable direction to lean, much safer than underdiagnosing them. And especially when there's no definitive test.
You sound like you are bi-polar/M.D. Not trying to troll or argue or anything.
I know several M.D. -- all high I.Q. When you talk about a new project, that is the mania side of your nature showing. When you say a cycle of brain chemical addiction, that is very much M.D. -- with sufferers typically addicted to the manic side. Many M.D. do not want to take Lithium (or the worse drugs like Depakote...strongly not recommended) because then they don't get their high any more. And in general they don't think they are M.D....
I blame that on focusing so hard on my hobbies that I can't really talk about much else. Both of the M.D. I am thinking of have their hobbies (that others call their addictions) and that is about it.
On the other hand, having cared for ADHD types, there is no sign of them having any hobbies. They can't eat, chew gum and read without trying to do all three at the same time. They sure as heck aren't getting high I.Q. results on tests.
Anyway, just some food for thought, my friend.
I come here for the love
You're too stupid to have a clue, much less a hypothesis, you troll.
10,000 there was no depression, AIDS, or cancer.