Two articles by Robert Whitaker today. The first is from the Register Guard. Here is an excerpt: It’s time to end this grand experiment with psychiatric drugs For more than 20 years, our country has been conducting an extraordinary medical experiment. Ever since Prozac arrived on the market in 1987, our societal use of psychiatric... Continue Reading →
AstraZeneca to Pay $198 Million for Seroquel Lawsuits
This is all over the news and I'm feeling pretty burnt out on all of this so I've not been paying much attention. But it is a big deal so here you have it. Seroquel, like all the atypicals can cause diabetes and metabolic syndrome. I too gained about 100 lbs with Risperdal (an atypical... Continue Reading →
Party drug as antidepressant and Pharma is running out of ideas for psychiatry
How nice to know that the horse tranquilizer that later gained fashion in the RAVE party community as a good somewhat hallucinatory high is being refashioned by pharma as an antidepressant. Sounds really sound and sane, doesn't it? Why, I wonder, don't more people see the connection between illicit drug-use and psychopharma? One is legitimized, the... Continue Reading →
Anatomy of an Epidemic– Comments by Dr. John Breeding
I'll make it an Anatomy of an Epidemic day and put John Breeding's youtube video review of the book here today too. Comments from youtube: Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America Comments by John Breeding Dr. John Breeding give a book review of Anatomy... Continue Reading →
The Rise of Psychopharmaceuticals
The Rise of Psychopharma 1987-2010 ~~ by Mary Ackerley MD, MDH who is a Harvard and Johns Hopkins trained board certified psychiatrist. She now practices holistic psychiatry. Robert Whitaker's brilliant book Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America asks a simple question. Why , if psychiatric drug treatments are so efficacious, has the number of people on disability for mental illness more than tripled in the last 25 years?
Informed consent: drugs and medications in mental health
Informed consent is necessary when it comes to drugs and medications -- I say all the below having been gravely harmed by prescribed psychiatric drugs. I am drug free today but I am not free from the harm the drugs wrought in my life. I am very motivated to help people find options that they might not feel forced to take drugs. Feeling forced, is not really a choice at all, is it? Until the time we have a sane infrastructure of care, we must be both pragmatic and compassionate about the reality on the ground.
Pharma can hurt you, anytime during the life of a drug: Wednesday news and blogs
Inside the Risky World of Drug-Trial 'Guinea Pigs' - Research - The Chronicle of Higher Education -- Human volunteers in university research may not realize the dangers they face, an anthropologist has found Medications found to cause long term cognitive impairment of aging brain -- PhysOrg.com -- Anticholinergics, from Benedryl to Paxil and more. --... Continue Reading →
Review of Anatomy of an Epidemic by one of it’s casualties
This is a review written by Susan Schechter from If You're Going Through Hell Keep Going where it was published first. It's a painfully intimate review that only one of us, those who've been harmed, could write. Thank you, Susan, for contributing this piece to Beyond Meds. Robert Whitaker's latest book "Anatomy of an Epidemic"... Continue Reading →
Just for fun: disturbing stats on BIG PHARMA
Source: Online Colleges and Universities
A Schizophrenia Mystery Solved? by Robert Whitaker
One of the enduring mysteries in schizophrenia research circles has been the disparity in outcomes between schizophrenia patients in "developing countries" and those in "developed" countries. The mystery arose in 1979 when World Health Organization investigators announced that, in a five-year study, patients in developing countries had fared better than those in the United States... Continue Reading →
Beyond Meds and Beyond the Dosies
Spit, Bristle and Fury posted commentary on the Dosie's and the post I published about them yesterday: Gianna Kali’s always informative and often pharma-critical blog, Beyond Meds was up for a Dosie — a new award “created to find the best examples of social media in pharma and healthcare.” Out of the 550 nominees, not surprisingly,... Continue Reading →