Psychotropic Drugs and Children: Robert Whitaker, author of Anatomy of an Epidemic, discusses the disturbing effects of psychotropic drugs prescribed for children. Such medications, used for ADHD, depression, and anxiety, for example, have become commonplace over the past 30 years. This practice profoundly alters the lives of the children, and so now we, as a... Continue Reading →
Bipolar before the psychopharmacology era
From Robert Whitaker's website links showing how bipolar disorder, too, has been exacerbated since the advent of heavy pharmacological intervention. Polypharmacy/Bipolar illness A. Bipolar Illness Before the Psychopharmacology Era Prior to 1955, bipolar illness was a rare disorder. There were only 12,750 people hospitalized with that disorder in 1955. In addition, there were only about... Continue Reading →
FDA panel okays more antipsychotics for children
Not approval yet but getting there. I covered this story last week. For continued coverage click on through to Furious Seasons. Update: More commentary by Philip Dawdy added after this post went up.
The best natural healer turns out to be nature
All those kids with ADHD and bipolar disorder?? How do they (in general) spend most of their time? On video games and other passive engagement. Not the way we did when we were kids running around all over the place in the great outdoors. Nature is an important part of everyone's life and we cut... Continue Reading →
Indicator species — By Steven Morgan
Steven has been a guest contributor numerous times now and I never stop delighting in how he sees the world. For all his pieces on this blog see here. Most of those pieces are by him. I think two of them simply speak of his work, but it was the easiest way for me to... Continue Reading →
Christopher Lane: on Madness Radio and on making a splash in the mental health blogosphere
From Madness Radio: Do pharmaceutical companies control the social definition of normal? Can advertising and public relations campaigns turn acceptable personality differences into unacceptable disorders? British-American literary critic and historian Christopher Lane discusses his book Shyness: How Normal Behavior Became a Sickness, including the way politics and profits drive the bible of mental health treatment,... Continue Reading →
Children and meds again…
A lot of people get excited when they see articles like this in the LA Times today. I'm getting sick of them. They simply don't go far enough: 'I need these pills refilled," the weary mother says, displaying an array of empty bottles on the desk in my office. "My son is bipolar." The boy,... Continue Reading →
Strattera causes psychosis, hallucinations, mania and agitation—warnings issued
Stattera is a SNRI, like Effexor and Cymbalta. And we already know that SSRIs can cause all the above adverse reactions. I hope this will continue to make people think twice about smacking the bipolar label on kids when what's really going on is a serious drug reaction. Official warnings issued: The ADHD drug Strattera... Continue Reading →
Interesting reads
The Last Psychiatrist on academic moneys from pharma. I don't know if you all have followed the whole Harvard debacle involving Biederman the bipolar child God. I've been keeping and eye on Biederman and Harvard through Furious Seasons for a long time. This is a very interesting analysis of the situation. And another scandal involving... Continue Reading →
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