Drugs

Psychiatry is now claiming that research has shown that antipsychotics reduce mortality among the seriously mentally ill. A critical review of the literature reveals that this claim is best described as the the field's latest "delusion" about the merits of these drugs.

During the past twenty years, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and American psychiatry have adopted a "medicalized" approach to preventing suicide, claiming that antidepressants are protective against suicide. Yet, the suicide rate in the United States has increased 30% since 2000, a time of rising usage of antidepressants. A review of studies of the effects of mental health treatment and antidepressants on suicide reveals why this medicalized approach has not only failed, but pushed suicide rates higher.

The American Journal of Psychiatry Needs to Retract Study That Reported Fraudulent Results

Psychiatry has long turned a blind eye to the full scope of harm associated with TD. New TD drugs "work" by further impairing brain function.

At the Hurdalsjøen Recovery Center in Norway, patients with a long history of psychiatric hospitalizations are tapering from their medications and, in a therapeutic environment that emphasizes a good diet, exercise, and asking patients "what do they want in life," are leaving their old lives as chronic patients behind.

Pharmaceutical companies paid psychiatrists $340 million from 2014 through 2020, corrupting every aspect of the testing and marketing of new psychiatric drugs.

Jeffrey LIeberman and colleagues have published a paper in the American Journal of Psychiatry stating that there is no evidence that psychiatric drugs cause long-term harm, and that the evidence shows that these drugs provide a great benefit to patients. A close examination of their review reveals that it is a classic example of institutional corruption, which was meant to protect guild interests.

Lancet Psychiatry, a UK-based medical journal, recently published a study that concluded brain scans showed that individuals diagnosed with ADHD had smaller brains. That conclusion is belied by the study data. The journal needs to retract this study. UPDATE: Lancet Psychiatry (online) has published letters critical of the study, and the authors' response, and a correction.

After a meta-analysis of RCTs of antidepressants was published in Lancet, psychiatry stated that it proved that "antidepressants" work. However, effectiveness studies of real-world patients reveal the opposite: the medications increase the likelihood that patients will become chronically depressed, and disabled by the disorder.

For the past 15 years, the VA's suicide prevention efforts have focused on getting veterans screened and treated for psychiatric disorders, with antidepressants a first-line therapy. This effort has caused veteran suicide rates to steadily rise.

This review of the scientific literature, stretching across six decades, makes the case that antipsychotics, over the long-term, do more harm than good. The drugs lower recovery rates and worsen functional outcomes over longer periods of time.

In 2008, a reviewer of psychiatric drugs at the FDA, Ron Kavanagh, complained to Congress that the FDA was approving a new antipsychotic that was ineffective and yet had adverse effects that increased the risk of death. Twelve years later, a review of the whistleblower documents reveal an FDA approval process that can lead to the marketing of drugs sure to harm public health.

In his new book, former NIMH director Thomas Insel, while exploring the causes of poor mental health outcomes in the United States, omits any mention of NIMH studies that tell of how the drugs worsen long-term outcomes.

The prescribing of stimulants to preschoolers diagnosed with ADHD is on the rise, which is said to be an "evidence-based" practice. A review of that "evidence base" reveals that claims that ADHD is characterized by genetic and brain abnormalities are belied by the data, and that the NIMH trial of methylphenidate in this age group told of long-term harm.

After Joanna Moncrieff and colleagues published their study debunking the low-serotonin theory of depression, the editor of Mad in Sweden, Lasse Mattila, wrote Sweden’s...

The FDA recently approved lumateperone for schizophrenia. A review of the clinical trials reveals a testing process that is fatally flawed, and a new drug coming to market that doesn't provide a clinically meaningful benefit.

The increased prescribing of antipsychotics, which frequently cause a brain injury that manifests as tardive dyskinesia, has provided pharmaceutical companies with a lucrative new market opportunity.

After 18 years, the full story of the scientific corruption in a study of paroxetine for bipolar disorder, and the psychiatrist who blew the whistle.

We talk with Dr. Michael Hengartner about his new book which addresses the overprescribing of antidepressant drugs and critically examines the scientific evidence on their efficacy and safety.

In Israel, there is a budding Soteria movement that foretells of a possible paradigm shift in care. The thought is that such care may become a first-line treatment for newly psychotic patients.

Published reports of clinical trials of psychiatric drugs typically include a graphic showing the efficacy of the study drug in reducing symptoms of the...

Why does the U.S. describe perinatal screening as providing a proven benefit, while the task forces in the U.K. and Canada see no evidence of such benefit?