Antipsychotic Conference to Highlight Different Approaches to Treating Psychosis

Sunny Aslam
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I see many patients who want to stay on medications because they have been told for so long how necessary they are for them. But what evidence do we have that shows this? Meanwhile many patients get harmful side effects – like movement disorders, dulled cognition, obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, sexual side effects, muscle spasms, slowed movements, restlessness, etc., and I wonder; What if I am giving these meds not only for no recovery benefit, but am adding to the problems?

I love pushing the envelope on psychiatric treatment. What is best for my patients? More importantly, what do they want? They certainly have a right to be the driver of whether or not they take these medications. I am grateful that many of my patients trust me enough to have trials off of antipsychotic medications. APA recommendations, after all, are to taper and try patients off antipsychotic medications, if they have not had symptoms in one year. All of the above has changed the way I talk to patients about their treatment and recovery.

I helped organize an upcoming conference at Hutchings Psychiatric Center in Syracuse, NY on Pharmacological Treatment for Psychosis: Emerging Perspectives. I am excited about this conference because of my increasing ambivalence, based on the data, about prescribing antipsychotic medications, and a lack of a serious conversation about the pros and cons of these medications. On Oct. 2nd, 2014, clinicians and researchers will have a chance to have this conversation, including a discussion of the latest research on antipsychotic medication and long term outcomes.

Speakers will include Courtenay Harding, PhD, who found through her work that many patients with schizophrenia stopped taking antipsychotic medication over 3 decades and still had significant recovery. Martin Harrow, PhD, studied patients for 20 years and found that long-term recovery was higher in those that did not take antipsychotic medication. These results − combined with similar ones by Dr. Lex Wunderink (who is not speaking at the conference) from the Netherlands, have really shaken my view of antipsychotics.

It was pointed out to me that many of the patients who dropped out of Dr. Wunderink’s study were the sickest types of patients, similar to those I work with in Syracuse, New York. So some are skeptical about what his results mean to those of us who work with that group. I hope the sickest patients can be studied soon, randomized to be on and off meds.

I hope the conference will ignite an intense discussion about antipsychotic medication use that will continue for some time in the field. A randomized controlled trial on the most chronic and lowest functioning patients, on and off medications should be designed and executed in a safe way. These are answers that we need to know.

* * * * *

Admission to the conference is free, and we are inviting mental health clinicians, not just prescribers. The hope is to make it an academic discussion. You can register by contacting [email protected]. Patients, families and others are welcome as well.

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Mad in America hosts blogs by a diverse group of writers. These posts are designed to serve as a public forum for a discussion—broadly speaking—of psychiatry and its treatments. The opinions expressed are the writers’ own.

31 COMMENTS

  2. By the way, I resent the use of the word ‘sickest’ given that many of the symptoms exhibited by our loved ones when they earned the label ‘sickest’ were medication related. If you are a recovering addict, the term disease is used to describe the constant craving for alcohol or drugs may be appropriate. If one was forcibly medicated for years in the absence of support to heal from traumatic events, and your brain develops a dependency on dopamine inhibiting drugs and you suffer from a rebound effect coming off these meds, don’t you think the term ‘sick’ is somewhat offensive, given the injustice and source of the sickness? I would be a lot more comfortable if you psychiatrists would be courageous enough to use the term iatrogenic harm routinely in your language. We parents are taking responsibility for what we did and didn’t do to help our children learn healthy coping mechanisms for grief and loss. Now its your turn, to tell your peers that they are not taking responsibility for the harm done to our children when they needed compassionate support for grief and loss. Clean up the language, please!

  3. Dr. Aslam,

    I think you answered your own question about the use of the toxic neuroleptics and other psych drugs causing much brain/body damage and a life shortened by about 25 years on average due to all the complications you include in your post not to mention the life destroying stigmas, loss of human, civil, democratic rights and self determination among other very negative factors.

    I give you credit for considering these hard questions and being willing to question the dangerous dogma you learned at school and listen to patients/survivors as well as critical psychiatrists at MIA and elsewhere instead.

    As far as what the KOL’s of the APA say about the studies showing the long term harm and low efficacy of neuroleptics long term while they cause huge harm, this is typical of them to continue this damaging paradigm despite all the evidence against it no matter how many people are destroyed. Even Dr. Thomas Insel, Head of the NIMH, has admitted that the DSM has no validity or scientific/medical evidence behind it and he has also admitted that antipsychotics do not work that well, can cause long term harm and that some may be far better off without them.

    If you read Robert Whitaker’s Anatomy of An Epidemic, he has cited information that shows that prior to psychiatry’s selling out to Big Pharma in the 1980’s and adopting their single minded drugging paradigm, people who really had symptoms labeled manic depression or schizophrenia tended to recover, return to work and lead normal lives and often have only one episode. Of course, now we have serial killers, rapists and abusers and their traumatized victims stigmatized as bipolar to push this latest fraud fad of psychiatry or their latest “sacred symbol” to justify their existence.

    Due to what Dr. Peter Breggin, Psychiatrist, and author of Toxic Psychiatry and Your Drug May Be Your Problem, 2nd ed., calls brain disabling treatments used today, most people subjected to psychiatry’s toxic neuroleptics, ECT and other types of lobotomies, restraints and social control, never fully recover, return to work or have full meaningful lives while a vast number are on Social Security Disability for life at huge cost to the tax payer in addition to the huge cost of this fraudulent, deadly treatment in the guise of medicine so that the APA KOL’s, Big Pharma and corrupt government hacks could/can make billions at the cost of millions of destroyed lives. Of course, this is not about medicine but rather about obscene profits for the 1% and social control/eugenics in the guise of health to blame the victims for increasing injustice, oppression, inequality, global enslavement, theft of all global resources and wealth by the 1%, etc.

    I’m glad that you are questioning this failed paradigm of psychiatry. You may want to check out Dr. Loren Mosher, Dr. Peter Breggin and others who fought against this hijacking of psychiatry and promoted/promote treatments that help people.

    The following book, Pseudoscience in Biological Psychiatry: Blaming the Body is highly recommended in the review below:

    http://www.antipsychiatry.org/br-pibp.htm

  4. Dear Dr Sunny
    Thanks for representing the horrible truth regarding ‘medications’ in your first paragraph. I came off Fluphenazine Decoanate injections 30 years ago, and made full recovery as a result.
    The withdrawal syndrome was deadly, and this is why CBT style psychotherapy was so helpful – because it showed me how to get through the anxiety and panic attacks.
    I didn’t taper right off all medication at the time, I settled for very low safe doses.

  5. Fiachra,

    I’m always glad to see how you were helped with psychotherapy after the great harm you suffered from psych drugs.

    Dr. Richard Bentall, a highly recognized expert in treating psychosis, “schizophrenia” and similar problems, has fought against main stream psychiatry’s failed stigma/drugging agenda for many years and conducts such CBT psychotherapy with his clients with many good results:

    http://www.amazon.com/Doctoring-Mind-Current-Treatment-Illness/dp/0814791484

  6. Sunny,

    Thank you for helping to organize a conference that will highlight the different approaches that exist to treat psychotic symptoms.

    I appreciate the fact your MIA bio states that you are “a forceful advocate for goal-based treatment versus illness-based treatment” and that you enjoy “challenging psychiatry residents and medical students to question traditional psychiatric treatment.”

    Even for the most experienced psychopharmacologist, treating a patient in a psychotic state can be extremely challenging.

    Many patients suffering from psychotic symptoms are legally forced into contracting and paying for the service of providers/facilities and purchase/consume potentially harmful pharmaceutical products.

    In any other practice, forced contracts would be considered a violation of consumer rights and illegal. In any other industry, forcing a consumer to purchase products is unheard of.

    From the stance of a social justice advocate, in order to ensure consumers of anti-psychotic products and services are provided with the most ethical, humane and evidence-based recover strategies available, I love pushing the envelope on psychiatric treatment too.

    In March of 1996, I suffered an acute psychotic episode and after seeking trustworthy opinions on where to find expert help, my family members were told to bring me to the emergency room at Upstate University Hospital in Syracuse.

    Although my family members informed the treating physicians that for over a decade I had been exposed to chemical toxins in the work environment and begged them to test for chemical poisoning, a psych referral was made and I was quickly assessed as having manic-depression with psychotic features, medicated and admitted into the psych ward.

    Below is a link to a narrative published in the Journal of Participatory Medicine that explains more about my recovery from psychosis [1]

    Also pasted below is an abstract published by the Department of Psychiatry at SUNY Upstate regarding a 15-year-old girl who was misdiagnosed with Bipolar I disorder with catatonic features. Two years later the correct diagnosis was finally made and she was treated with steroids. After the underlying condition was accurately diagnosed and treated, she no longer needed psychiatric medication or therapy. [2]

    There are dozens of underlying medical conditions/substances that can induce psychotic states and be misdx’d as sz/bp.

    Most industries that strive to avoid mistakes use the risk management process to create process improvements and best practice standards.

    A best practice is a method or technique that has consistently shown results superior to those achieved with other means, and that is used as a benchmark. In addition, a “best” practice can evolve to become better as improvements are discovered.

    The British Medical Journal published a step-by-step guideline for the best practice assessment of psychosis. [3]

    It is very unfortunate that psychiatrists fail to use best practice assessment guidelines and instead use the DSM5 with a”Chinese Menu” approach to assign labels of “mental illness”.

    The end result is misdiagnosis, prolonged suffering of patients and in some cases, public safety is jeopardized.

    I hope you will consider highlighting the value of best practice assessment at this conference.

    [1] Psychosis Possibly Linked to an Occupational Disease: An e-Patient’s Participatory Approach to Consideration of Etiologic Factors http://www.jopm.org/perspective/narratives/2011/03/28/psychosis-possibly-linked-to-an-occupational-disease-an-e-patient%E2%80%99s-participatory-approach-to-consideration-of-etiologic-factors/

    [2] Neuropsychiatric systemic lupus erythematosus presenting as bipolar I disorder with catatonic features.

    Psychosomatics. 2009 Sep-Oct;50(5):543-7.
    Alao AO, Chlebowski S, Chung C.
    SOURCE
    Department of Psychiatry, SUNY Upstate, NY 13210, USA. [email protected]

    ABSTRACT
    BACKGROUND:
    The American College of Rheumatology has defined 19 neuropsychiatric syndromes associated with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) involving the central, peripheral, and autonomic nervous systems. Neuropsychiatric manifestations of lupus (NPSLE) have been shown to occur in up to 95% of pediatric patients with SLE.

    OBJECTIVE:
    The authors describe a 15-year-old African American young woman with a family history positive for bipolar I disorder and schizophrenia, who presented with symptoms consistent with an affective disorder.

    METHOD:
    The patient was diagnosed with Bipolar I disorder with catatonic features and required multiple hospitalizations for mood disturbance. Two years after her initial presentation, the patient was noted to have a malar rash and subsequently underwent a full rheumatologic work-up, which revealed cerebral vasculitis.

    RESULTS:
    NPSLE was diagnosed and, after treatment with steroids, the patient improved substantially and no longer required further psychiatric medication or therapy.

    CONCLUSION:
    Given the especially high prevalence of NPSLE in pediatric patients with lupus, it is important for clinicians to recognize that neuropsychiatric symptoms in an adolescent patient may indeed be the initial manifestations of SLE, as opposed to a primary affective disorder.

    [3] BMJ: helping doctors make better decisions
    Step-by-step diagnostic approach
    The evaluation of the acutely psychotic patient includes a thorough history and physical examination, as well as laboratory tests. Based on the initial findings, further diagnostic tests may be warranted.

    http://psychoticdisorders.wordpress.com/bmj-best-practice-assessment-of-psychosis/

    • These two videos provide great insights into problems with the current perspectives on treating “mental disorders”.

      In the first video, Syracuse psychiatrist Mantosh Dewan, former Chair of the Department of Psychiatry at SUNY Upstate Medical University, is promoting what seems like a Cliff Notes version of psychotherapies to help his peers “quickly catch up” in order to provide patients “solution-focused treatment”. He also states that biological psychiatry (treatment with medications) is somewhat “easier” than psychotherapy.

      This would make one think that rather than maintaining a best practice standard of care, psychiatrists routinely choose the “easier” way to treat patients through medication management.

      In the second video, author Dr. Julie Holland talks about her book “Weekends at Bellevue”. She explains that she likes psychopharmacology better than psychotherapy because it is “quicker” and it better suits her personality as an “impatient person”. Dr. Holland admits that just shooting people up with drugs is fast but does not fix the underlying problems. She admits that she deprives her patients best practice standards of care.

      Persons labeled with mental disorders face stigma, discrimination and marginalization. They are in need of strong advocates who will push the envelope to ensure patients receive best practice standards of care.

      The court’s decision in Wyatt v. Stickney 325 F.Supp. 781 (M.D.Ala. 1971), stated patients have a “constitutional right to receive such individual treatment as will give each of them a realistic opportunity to be cured or to improve his or her mental condition.”

      Psychiatry’s quick and easy, rubber-stamp labeling system has not only created a medication management monopoly, it also violates a patient’s right to receive individual treatment that will prevent prolonged suffering and give way to optimum recovery.

      Advocates have a duty of care to ensure best practice standards are being advanced in our mental/behavioral health care system. Failure to do so is unethical.

      http://psychoticdisorders.wordpress.com/2014/02/18/promoting-integrated-treatment-are-psychiatrists-behind-on-solution-focused-therapy/

    • I am very curious about the notion of subjecting somebody to forced treatment and then charging them for it. I’m not a lawyer and I don’t know how contract law works in your country but that seems to fly in the face of standard modern legal principles. Does anybody know if this practice has ever been challenged in court? I’d be fascinated to read what a judge has to say on the subject.

      • Hi Francesca,

        Consumer protection could be the Achilles’ heel of coercive psychiatry.

        In the U.S., involuntary commitment is governed by state law and procedures vary from state to state.

        Here in Florida, state law maintains that involuntarily committed patients are responsible for the cost of the treatment and services they receive at the facilities they are literally being held captive in. The exception is felony arrests involving violence against another person.

        I questioned PsychRights attorney Jim Gottstein and he stated a long time ago he researched this situation and in every case he found the courts held this “forced to stay and forced to pay’ concept as constitutional.

        In my opinion, mental health consumers who are being billed for forced treatment should challenge coercive psychiatry as illegal forced contracts.

        Here is a copy of an outrageous bill that I received from forced treatment after experiencing psychosis from an untreated abscessed tooth in 2008.

        https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rl25nAtEWCZDC85aATy09i-gP9qQlxrVzzVxDabzSCM/edit?usp=sharing

        I wrote a letter of complaint to the facility claiming this bill was an illegal forced contract. The facility dropped the charges and I did not pay them one penny.

        Another unfair practice occurs when mental health consumers purchase expensive pharmaceutical products and they can not use these products because of unbearable side effects.

        As consumers, they should have the right to return defective pharmaceutical products to the store they purchased them from and get their money back.

        This consumer right does not exist and patients loose money because they are advised by medical professionals to purchase defective products that are not being recalled.

        Consumer protection is greatly needed in mental health care.

      • It’s not only in US, also in Austria you can be forced to stay in hospital and then to pay for it. I’d say it’s illegal but I have not seen anyone challenge that. The truth is: psychiatric patients’ rights are being violated on a daily basis and few have the resources and ability to challenge those. Plus statues of limitation are sometimes absurdly short.

        • Interesting.

          In my favorite movie of all time Brazil, the Government has a policy of making anyone suspected of committing a crime liable to pay for their interrogation.

          When the main character finds himself trapped in the system and suspected of ‘terrorism’ he is told by one of the police officers that he should confess quickly, or you will destroy your credit rating.

          As you are paying they have motive to continue torturing you until you confess, and you will confess. Holding out is just going to run up the bill.

          I wonder if the director has even been subjected to psychiatric treatment lol

    • “legally forced into contracting and paying for the service of providers/facilities and purchase/consume potentially harmful pharmaceutical products”
      Which is a disgrace. No one should be forced to pay for forced treatment, it’s adding insult to injury.

    • I have not met a single psychiatrists who even considered asking about any physical symptoms or investigated physical causes of mental distress. They are supposed to do that every time and they do it like, well, never.

      • Hi B,

        Yes, same experience here and it it not just psychiatrists who we have to blame.

        Where are our mental health advocates?????

        It is unbelievable how psychiatry has sold underlying medical conditions/substances that can induce altered states of mind as ” severe mental illness”.

        Here is an interesting case:

        John Maxwell Montin experienced a medication-induced psychotic state and spent two decades of his life involuntarily committed and forcibly treated for “mental illness” at the Lincoln Regional Center in Nebraska.

        Last year, a psychiatrist employed by the center recognized that Montin was misdiagnosed as “mentally ill” and he was finally released.

        Montin recently filed a malpractice lawsuit in federal court seeking $23.4 million in damages. The lawsuit claims that he was incorrectly labelled “mentally ill”, unnecessarily held in the psychiatric facility, and given unnecessary psychiatric treatment. The amount includes $808,000 in lost wages and $10.6 million in punitive damages. The lawsuit names 21 former or current staff members from the Lincoln Regional Center.

        http://isepp.wordpress.com/2014/07/14/former-psych-patient-files-malpractice-lawsuit-seeking-23-million-in-damages-for-being-misdiagnosed-mentally-ill/

        Many different medical conditions and substances can induce a psychotic state of mind and be misdiagnosed as “severe mental illness”.

        We need to start questioning why best practice standards are being ignored by our hospitals and by those who claim to be our advocates.

        Advocates have a duty of care and mental health advocates who promote an agenda without acknowledging best practice assessment standards are acting with negligence.

        Sooner or later common sense will kick in and mental health advocates will be forced to set their egos aside and form a unified advocacy agenda that supports the use of Functional Medicine to accurately determine underlying causes of what is being labeled as “severe mental illness”.

        Unfortunately, one man’s loss is another man’s gain, so the debates, the research, the books, the websites, the conferences, the summits and the profits will continue for some, while the medication, ECT, murders, suicides and suffering will continue for others.

        Maybe someday the “mentally ill” will place a class action lawsuit against their advocates for ignoring this information.

        By consensual agreement within the American Psychiatric Association psychiatric diagnoses are descriptive labels only for phenomenology, not etiological or mechanistic explanation for syndromes. Thus, a psychiatric diagnosis labels a pattern of signs and symptoms, but offers no hypothesis concerning the mechanism(s) of the clinical phenomena.(Davidoff et al.,1991).

        The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) classifications of psychotic disorders includes:

        Substance/Medication-induced psychotic disorder
        Psychotic disorder due to another medical condition
        293.81 With delusion as the predominant symptom
        293.82 With hallucinations as the predominant symptom
        Distinguishing medical conditions and substance-induced psychosis from schizophrenia or Bipolar disorder through clinical presentation often is difficult.

        Psychosis Due to a Medical Condition involve a surprisingly large number of different medical conditions, some of which include: brain tumors, cerebrovascular disease, Huntington’s disease, multiple sclerosis, Creitzfeld-Jakob disease, anti-NMDAR Encephalitis, herpes zoster-associated encephalitis, head trauma, infections such as neurosyphilis, epilepsy, auditory or visual nerve injury or impairment, deafness, migraine, endocrine disturbances, metabolic disturbances, vitamin B12 deficiency, a decrease in blood gases such as oxygen or carbon dioxide or imbalances in blood sugar levels, and autoimmune disorders with central nervous system involvement such as systemic lupus erythematosus have also been known to cause psychosis.

        A substance-induced psychotic disorder, by definition, is directly caused by the effects of drugs including alcohol, medications, and toxins. Psychotic symptoms can result from intoxication on alcohol, amphetamines (and related substances), cannabis (marijuana), cocaine, hallucinogens, inhalants, opioids, phencyclidine (PCP) and related substances, sedatives, hypnotics, anxiolytics, and other or unknown substances. Psychotic symptoms can also result from withdrawal from alcohol, sedatives, hypnotics, anxiolytics, and other or unknown substances.

        Some medications that may induce psychotic symptoms include anesthetics and analgesics, anticholinergic agents, anticonvulsants, antihistamines, antihypertensive and cardiovascular medications, antimicrobial medications, antiparkinsonian medications, chemotherapeutic agents, corticosteroids, gastrointestinal medications, muscle relaxants, nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory medications, other over-the-counter medications, antidepressant medications, neurleptic medications, antipsychotics, and disulfiram . Toxins that may induce psychotic symptoms include anticholinesterase, organophosphate insecticides, nerve gases, heavy metals, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and volatile substances (such as fuel or paint).

        • “Where are our mental health advocates?????”
          Well, I’ll take it as a good job. My advocate told me that doctors are good people and if I feel they didn’t do something properly I should complain directly to them and they will surely think about it. No kidding. She also stressed what kind of good relationship she has with them throughout the conversation and told me that I don’t have a case despite acknowledging that my rights were violated by that was in her view “minor”.
          Coercive psychiatry has to be abolished because any “safeguards” are by definition fictional.

      • Robert Sealey states that clinicians are failing to meet the their own practice guidelines. They need to do differential diagnosis, and restorative integrative treatment. Label and drug is a betrayal of their patients.

        Finding Restorative Care for Mental Illnessby Robert Sealey, BSc, CA
        http://www.mentalhealthrecovery.com/recovery-resources/articles.php?id=51

        One Person’s WRAP Plan: Recovery Using Restorative Orthomolecular Medicine
        by Robert Sealey, BSc, CA
        http://www.mentalhealthrecovery.com/recovery-resources/articles.php?id=50

        Robert Sealey appears in the 54 minute video “Masks of Madness”
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJfHB4NHUXI

        Label and drug –
        “Each of the mental disorders is conceptualized as a clinically significant behavioral or psychological syndrome.” (Thus these “disorder” categories are (at best) syndrome labels as with the syndrome label of Pneumonia and by themselves do not suggest any particular Medical treatment – that is, differential diagnosis and restorative treatments are needful. )

        Read more, Wikipedia DSM Manual http://sevencounties.org/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=8212&cn=18

        Vincent Bellonzi, DC on Functional Restorative Medicine instead of quick Labeling and Drugging
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeq6xRU2ASQ

  7. Dr. Aslam, Thats the ticket , lets do another study,while we simultaneously contemplate our navels. Don’t you get “THE FAT LADY HAS SUNG”.
    We do not need to go through the tobacco company “Lets do another study ” endless run around.Create doubt and run em around forever .
    If you are personally uncertain follow Dr. Bentall example and sample neuroleptics for yourself. One day of divided doses of thorazine 800mgs total, followed the next day with 1 bilateral electric shock “treatment” straight up. It would be better than a Harvard education for any psychiatrist or academic and cheaper and quicker.
    Soon after you will no longer question the weaning off of “meds” strategy.
    Sincerely ,Fred Abbe

    • I recommend any of Zyprexa, Seroquel or Abilify. For me: narcolepsy (dismissed by the idiot psychiatrist: “the pamphlet says you can be a bit tired”), zombification and restless leg syndrome (which persisted for over a yr after stopping the meds – no it doesn’t go away immediately when you stop the meds), nausea and vomitting.
      Not needing to mention that none of it helped my “symptoms” whatever they were, they probably made things worse.

  8. Dr. Aslam and Maria Mangicaro,

    We must start questioning why best practice standards are being ignored by hospitals and absolutely by those who claim to be advocates! Will Dr. Aslam’s conference, Oct 2, 2014, in NY begin this dialogue??????

    Maria, you were the MIA blogger who opened my eyes to the BMJ ” Best Practice Standards for Assessing Psychosis” . I absolutely know had my son been evaluated using these guidelines, the true cause of my first-born son’s two bouts of altered reality, 18 months apart, literally overnight was due to his admitted use of today’s potent cannabis strain ( referred to as skunk) as THC was present both times on the toxicology reports. Indeed, as Maria so eloquently points out there are many underlying medical conditions and substances that induce psychotic episodes yet are pathetically dx by psychiatry as bipolar or a spectrum of schizophrenia disorder. This happened to my son, twice.

    Despite the truth my 23 y/0 son who had always been healthy, had many accomplishments, newly married with an extremely charismatic personality, he was quickly locked up in a psych ward, beaten by the night staff as he tried to flee ( what human being wouldn’t do the same thing once inside a locked unit with hypodermic needles in the hands of cold, intimidating staff not the least interested in asking what happened and tell us your story so we can help your recovery). No thorough interview with my son, who was ” taken down” ( the staff explanation to his family and friends who rallied to support him.) No phone call to my son’s bride, or myself, both our contact numbers listed in his HIPAA waiver. No questions regarding any possible medical conditions, and in spite of my son’s (+) toxicology report for a mind-altering substance in his young brain the dx was ” psychosis NOS, rule out bipolar one”. Did a p-doc interview my son’s family to assess if there was a h/o manic-depression ( there was none) and any other severe MI? NO ONE, just rush to judge, label, stigmatize with a permanent, MI, and further assault with huge doses of toxic antipsychotics.

    My initial suspicions -cannabis- was the trigger behind both altered breaks, but neither psych hospitals, accepted – cannabis- could create a psychosis. As I reflect back with the mounting scientific studies, even than I ask why didn’t the ” system” bothered to search PubMed as I did? With actual data just released from Public Health England over the last 4 yrs, 50% increase in teens referred for drug rehab because of cannabis addiction, a 7 X rate of psychosis ‘episode’ for skunk users ( 80% of cannabis strains used now). Of course, my son suffered a ” temporary” psychosis until the last of the lipophilic THC molecules left his brain cells. INSTEAD my son was boxed in with the MI dx. Imagine the horror being misdiagnosed with a lifelong MI, and all the stigma attached, from using this ” herb” that society continues to, erroneously, NOT realize can cause psychosis. I accept society remains misinformed BUT I hold the psychiatric professional accountable. Their denial, ignorance, and refusal to analyze correctly a young man who had the strongest social skills, prior to entering the psychiatric wasteland, who deserved to be listened to, not demeaned, and insanely drugged into a drugged, stuporous state. The outcome happening for misdiagnosis: catastrophic.

    • I am so sorry for you, your son and his family :(. I know that many doctors tend to ignore whatever patients or their families are trying to tell them, just because they “know better” and act from the position of authority. There are smart and dedicated doctors out there who will take you seriously and listen to what you’re saying whether they’ll consider it relevant or not but the pervasive attitude it to dismiss the patient, often in an aggressive or dismissive manner. I have encountered this attitude many times in a doctor’s office. I also have this experience with a psychiatrists whom I’ve send an article from Pubmed that I though was relevant but he didn’t do as much as to take a look at it and dismissed it out of hand. Needless to say he also didn’t listen to anything I said unless it confirmed what he assumed in the 1st 5 minutes after we met. People like that are negligent idiots and are simply dangerous for their patients.

  9. Good work organizing this conference, Dr. Aslam.

    One of the primary issues with major tranquillizers is using nutrients for prophylaxis against drug induced harms. No reason to be so neglectful of nutrient chemicals as chemotherapeutic agents as to leave harm prophylaxis out of consideration. Famously Richard Kunin, M.D. noted that phenothiazine molecules would be manganese chelators (chemically nab onto) – and manganese is needed for the mn SOD (large internal antioxidant) that protects dopamine neurons in the nigrostriatal region.

    Charles Gant, MD, also of Syracuse NY, has a fine introductory article on the topic of nutrient-chemical prophylaxis for psych drug harms.

    Mn Superoxide dismutase is needful to protect dopamine cells:
    https://www.google.com/#q=manganese+Mn+SOD+nigrostriatal+dopaminergic+neurons+%22tardive+dyskinesia%22&spell=1

    Charles Gant, M.D.
    Nutritional Protection from the Damaging Effects
    http://www.alternativementalhealth.com/articles/natural.htm

    Walter Lemmo, N.D. Nutritional Treatment of Tardive Dyskinesia
    http://www.alternativementalhealth.com/articles/td.htm

    Richard Kunan, M.D. 1973 discovers importance of magnesium chelation by phenothiazines
    https://www.google.com/#q=Richard+Kunan+manganese

    These chemicals are single patented molecules and calling them antipsychotic medications is over the top in the fashion of marketing planners. (“Antidepressants medications” do not have little smiley faces on each molecule.)

    What do these patented sales products like the hugely profitable dopamine 2 receptor antagonists have going for them? Well by blocking neurological communication at the receptor level these dopamine blockade chemicals can blot out any unwanted behavior. (The chemical straitjacket. [1] While people whose brain’s are currently dysfunctioning such that they may be subject to receive a DSM descriptive label of “psychotic disorder” may have elevated dopamine which calls for differential medical diagnosis and appropriate medical treatment [2] rather than a DSM type “Mental” “Psychiatric” diagnosis (involving no medical tests) and mental “meds” as “the treatment” (Profitable centrally acting drugs. [3]

    These drugs also interestingly (in different ways according to which specific particular drug) are pro-oxidant (no surprise there, tight?) and strongly antioxidant. Two things immediately come into question – is part of the therapeutic value, the treatment impact, seen with a particular anti-psychotic drug due to its ability to pass through the blood brain barrier and act as a strong anti-oxidant? Should a mixture of other antioxidant chemicals be used instead? For these dopamine blockade drugs having known (or research able) deleterious pro-oxidant implications, obviously, a combined treatment (such as with anti-oxidant chemicals and manganese) to address this pro-oxidant component should be given – rather than the drugging agent as the stand alone treatment.

    Pro-oxidant and strong antioxidant qualities:
    Mechanism of Action of Antipsychotics
    Graduate Thesis Paper by Vijaylaxmi Mahapatra Sahu
    https://tl-ph.facebook.com/WNUSP/posts/10201825473370807

    Potent brain antioxidant chemical Ginko biloba extract (strongly protects against lipid oxidation) added to drug Haloperidol (which causes lipid oxidation)
    see – Zhang et al Ginkgo and Haldol works better than Haldol alone
    http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16906395
    http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?cmd=search&term=Zhang%20Xy%5Bau%5D&dispmax=50
    https://fr-fr.facebook.com/ProgressiveOregon/posts/10201747939272503?stream_ref=5

    There are a number of varied germane topic areas.

    Peter Lehmann writes of the value of lowered or halved dosages for reducing depression and suicidality caused by these drugs
    http://www.peter-lehmann-publishing.com/articles/lehmann/suicide.htm

    These so-called antipsychotic drugs are also mentioned as anti-fungal, antihistamine, antibiotic, and antiviral.

    There are a number of pharmacological impacts associated with the drugs in this class of patented centrally acting drugs that are going to be of importance, beyond being powerful antioxidants able to cross the blood barrier.

    Anti-fungal, antibiotic, and antiviral.

    Candida albicans in the schizophrenia –
    https://www.google.com/#q=yeast+of+candidiasis+schizophrenias+Walsh+OR+Philpott+Edelman

    A cheap antibiotic normally prescribed to teenagers for acne is to be tested as a treatment for “schizophrenia”
    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/scientists-shocked-to-find-antibiotics-alleviate-symptoms-of-schizophrenia-7469121.html

    Antifungal drugs and mental illness
    https://www.google.com/#q=schizophrenia+antifungal

    Is Your Cat Making You Crazy? Toxoplasma Parasite
    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2099431/Is-cat-making-crazy-Feline-parasite-cause-schizophrenia-humans.html

    Good luck with your conference, and much success to you in your endeavors .

    Daniel Burdick, Eugene Oregon USA

    1) An intellectual charts the progression of deterioration of his interest in life once drugging commenced –

    Leonid Plyushch “My interest in political problems quickly disappeared, then my interest in scientific problems, and then my interest in my wife and children.”

    – https://sites.google.com/site/punishingthepatient/prisoners/treatment-or-torture
    – https://www.google.com/#q=Leonid+Plyushch+Eva+Edelman
    -http://jonrappoport.wordpress.com/2014/02/01/soviet-psychiatric-drug-for-dissidents-given-to-us-patients

    1b) Lawrence Stevens, J.D.

    “On the internet, L. Stevens, a lawyer, described the tranquilizer psychosis as follows. ” These major tranquilizers cause misery – not tranquility. They physically, neurologically blot out most of a person’s ability to think and act, even at commonly given doses. By disabling people, they can stop almost any thinking or behaviour the therapist wants to stop.”
    http://www.doctoryourself.com/hoffer_psychosis.html

    2) Elevated dopamine in a bodily/mental condition that is seen nowadays as calling for medical help rather that psychiatric diagnosis and psychiatric patent medication.

    Over-methylated: Low histamine and elevated serotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine
    http://www.nutritional-healing.com.au/content/articles-content.php?heading=Major+Mental+Illness+Biochemical+Subtypes

    “Overmethylation increases activity of dopamine, norepinephrine and serotonin, creating overstimulation and histapenia symptoms (e.g., anxiety, voices, hypomania, paranoia…). Methylation does this by decreasing expression of transporters that remove these neurotransmitters from the synapse. For example, methylation decreases the creation of dopamine transporters, leaving more dopamine in the synapse, thereby increasing dopamine messages.” http://naturalhealingforschizophrenia.blogspot.com/2013/09/ii-histapenia-chemistry-and-general.html

    2b) Differential Diagnosis
    Robert Sealey, BSc One Patient’s Recovery from a Bipolar II Mood Disorder
    http://www.searpubl.ca/recoverystory.html
    http://www.searpubl.ca/Mental%20Patient%20Safety%20Alert.pdf

    2c) Commentary on Nutritional Treatment of Mental Disorders
    from Willam Walsh, Ph.D., Senior Scientist, Walsh Research Institute
    http://www.alternativementalhealth.com/articles/walshMP.htm

    2d) Psychiatric Presentations of Medical Illness
    http://www.alternativementalhealth.com/articles/diamond.htm

    2e) David Moyer, LCSW – Beyond Mental Illness
    http://beyondmentalillness.us/about/

    ” It is about biological/behavioral (bio behavioral) syndromes that rob us and our family members of the ability to love and work.

    This site is about my family’s struggle to ensure that various biological disorders that affect my son and others like him are identified and treated as effectively as possible. This site is about moving beyond mental illness by changing the assessment and treatment paradigm. Psychotropic medications should be the last alternative saved for those cases where exhaustive diagnostic procedures have failed to identify treatable biological markers.”

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