Obesity/Metabolic Syndrome

Treating attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) with stimulants affects growth and is likely to cause a higher BMI in later adolescence, according to research from...

When a foster youth encounters a Psychiatrist, chances are high that s/he will get medicated. Traumatized foster youth are often prescribed powerful psychotropics due to exhibiting a wide variety of “normal reactions to abnormal events,” such as despair, agitation, anxiety and self-harm. The practice has been well documented; foster children are prescribed psychotropics at a 2.7 to 4.5 times higher rate than non-foster youth. The National Center for Youth Law aptly summarizes the problem as; too many (25% of foster youth medicated), too soon (300 children under the age of 5 in California are given psychotropics annually) too much (adult dosages) and for too long (no planning or reviews for possible discontinuation).

Children diagnosed with an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) are much more likely to be prescribed a psychotropic medication.

New evidence suggests that children on ADHD medication may have stunted growth initially but more rapid increases in body mass over time.

Johnson & Johnson is exposed to personal injury and product liability lawsuits over the failure to warn about Risperdal gynecomastia side effects in boys.

A large review and meta-analysis of 167 studies across 60 years dissects placebo-controlled randomized controlled trials of antipsychotic drugs.

My world turned upside down when my daughter nearly died from a serious suicide attempt. After several years as her caretaker I began to wonder: What can we do to change the way our mental health services are organized so they won't turn a crisis into a way of life for already distressed and vulnerable people?

Analysis of longitudinal data from 2000-2014 demonstrate mortality gap is widening between persons with a diagnosis of bipolar or schizophrenia compared to the general population

Researchers from the City College of New York and Columbia University published a study this month testing the hypothesis that people diagnosed with schizophrenia treated long-term with antipsychotic drugs have worse outcomes than patients with no exposure to these drugs. They concluded that there is not a sufficient evidence base for the standard practice of long-term use of antipsychotic medications.

Back in 2006, when my son Franklin was in his late twenties and living in a group home in the Boston area, he refused to take Clozaril any more because of the required bi-weekly blood draws. His doctor prescribed Zyprexa as a substitute, and Frank suddenly began to gain weight ... a lot of weight. Later, I would learn that UCLA psychiatrist Dr. William Wirshing had said of Zyprexa prior to its 1996 approval by the FDA: “It is just un-stinkin’-believable. It is the best drug for gaining weight I’ve ever seen.” The doctor indicated that taking ten milligrams of the medication was equivalent to ingesting 1,500 extra calories per day. My outrage knew no bounds.

Over the past twenty years, the number of prescriptions for atypical antipsychotics written to children and young adults between four and eighteen has increased...

According to new research by Joanna Moncrieff and Sebastião Viola, mental health problems have become the leading cause of disability claims in the UK. While the overall number of claims for other conditions has decreased by 35%, claims related to “mental disorders” have increased 103% since 1995.

New intervention shows promise in reducing over-prescription of off-label antipsychotics in older adults.

How does physical activity affect people diagnosed with bipolar, schizophrenia and major depressive disorders?

In this piece for The Cut, Dyan Neary details the story of Frankie Perry, a man whose life was forever altered by being prescribed an...

A systematic review published this week in the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology found that patients taking antipsychotic drugs were at nearly twice the risk...

I was a psychiatrist who participated in the Recovery After an Initial Schizophrenia Episode Early Treatment Program (RAISE ETP). Although I welcomed the positive headlines that heralded the study's results, the reports left me with mixed feelings. What happened to render the notion that talking to people about their experiences and helping them find jobs or go back to school is something novel?

Two patients have now died while taking the drug beloranib in an obesity drug trial. Both patients were in the active arm of the study and had received the drug rather than a placebo. Zafgen did not say whether it believed the drug had caused the blood clotting in the lungs that led to the patient’s death.

The researchers theorized that this increased effectiveness was due not to “antidepressant” properties, but rather to the drug’s side effects, which include insomnia, drowsiness, and nausea.

He could have asked me if there was a specific event that had precipitated my suicide attempt. He could have asked if I had a history of trauma. He could have simply asked, “What happened?” “What are you feeling?” or “So what’s going on?” Nope. He chose to open our meeting with an accusatory remark about a make-believe eating disorder.

Study finds that individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and depression have diets that are more inflammatory and higher in calories.

From The Washington Post: Despite major lawsuits and detailed reports pertaining to severe health risks associated with the antipsychotic Seroquel, the drug remains one of...

From Reuters: Two youth legal advocacy groups have filed a lawsuit against Missouri for over-exposing foster children to psychotropic drugs. The lawsuit seeks a court...

“Do they make people less aggressive? Yes, sometimes they do. Will they sedate people? Absolutely. Will they make kids easier to manage? They will,” Robert Whitaker tells Liz Spikol for Philadelphia Magazine. “But I know of no study that shows that medicating these kids long-term will help them grow up and thrive. The developing brain is a very delicate thing. The narrative is that these side effects are mild, and that’s just not true, and that the benefits are well-established, and so often they’re not.”

“What I’d really like to do is stop everything,” I say. The reality is that psychiatrists are not the experts when it comes to getting people off psychiatric drugs.