Stimulants

Even though about 10% of American children have been diagnosed with ADHD and most are taking stimulant medications for it, Boston Children’s Hospital researchers...

Psychiatrist Richard Friedman argues in the New York Times that there are aspects of natural brain development that make teenagers more prone to both...

The Melbourne Herald Sun reports that "The prescription of some atypical antipsychotics has more than doubled . . . Psychiatrist Dr George Halasz who has been vocal about...

The problem with instituting sweeping, costly and invasive mental health legislation is that there always are unintended consequences. The State of Connecticut, when passing Public Act 13-3, apparently didn’t consider that there are two sides to every story. And when it comes to “mental health” there most definitely is another side beyond the mental health we-need-early-intervention-to-help-those-suffering mantra.

On May 16, the New York Times ran an article titled Thousands of Toddlers Are Medicated for A.D.H.D., Report Finds, Raising Worries, by Alan Schwarz.  Here is the opening sentence: "More than 10,000 American toddlers 2 or 3 years old are being medicated for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder outside established pediatric guidelines, according to data presented on Friday by an official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention."

Dr. Mercola writes that "the high rates of psychotropic drug use among foster children and poor children is likely a direct result of drug...

A review of "potential neurobiological ramifications of the popular cognitive enhancers," in Frontiers of Systems Neuroscience, finds that stimulants reduce performance at higher dosages, and...

My name is Leah Harris and I'm a survivor. I am a survivor of psychiatric abuse and trauma. My parents died largely as a result of terrible psychiatric practice. Psychiatric practice that took them when they were young adults and struggling with experiences they didn’t understand. Experiences that were labeled as schizophrenia. Bipolar disorder. My parents were turned from people into permanent patients. They suffered the indignities of forced treatment. Seclusion and restraint. Forced electroshock. Involuntary outpatient commitment. And a shocking amount of disabling heavy-duty psychiatric drugs. And they died young, from a combination of the toxic effects of overmedication, and broken spirits.

An article in the Harvard Review of Psychiatry finds that the UK's new guidelines for treating attention and depression problems in children recommend a...

A new article by Peter Breggin, in the journal Children & Society, outlines The Rights of Children and Parents In Regard to Children Receiving...

In former times, children who were routinely inattentive and impulsive were considered to be in need of training and discipline. By and large, school teachers and parents provided this. In fact, the training was usually provided before the matter even became an issue. Today these children are spuriously and arbitrarily labeled as ill, and are given pills. At the present time the pharma-psychiatric system is being widely exposed as the spurious, destructive, disempowering fraud that it is. Organized psychiatry is responding to these criticisms not by cleaning up its act, but instead by increasing its lobbying activity in the political arena.

"Some powerful figures in mental health," according to today's New York Times, "are claiming to have identified a new disorder that could vastly expand the...

Salon.com points out that "While data point to at least some over diagnosis (of ADHD), at least in boys, the extent of this problem...

Research in the Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology finds that "Over the last two decades, the increased use of atypical antipsychotic medications, often...

My new book, Debunking ADHD: 10 Reasons to Stop Drugging Kids for Acting Like Kids, is scheduled to be released tomorrow, on April 1st. Really, no joke. To be honest, when my editor informed me of this unique release date, it didn't strike me as the most complimentary day to publish research that has been years in the making and is ultimately a very serious subject. As time passed and the big day has slowly approached, however, the release date has come to feel completely serendipitous! April Fool's Day is indeed the perfect day to re-energize a powerful movement to put an end to the drugging of kids for acting like kids. Like an unkind April Fool's Day prank, ADHD is a complete joke.

Esquire discovers that "By the time they reach high school, nearly 20 percent of all American boys will be diagnosed with ADHD. Millions of...

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...

Dr. Richard Saul comments in Time Magazine on this week's New York Times article on the dramatic increase in adults taking ADHD medication: "Over the...

The recently released report from Express Scripts showing a dramatic rise in the use of stimulant medications, often prescribed for ADHD, also shows that...

A report released today by Express Scripts, the nation's largest prescription drug manager, offers "the most current and comprehensive analysis of ADHD medication use"...

Prior admissions with stimulant disorder, but not a prior cannabis disorder diagnosis, are a negative prognostic sign in first-episode psychosis according to new research...

According to the University of South Dakota's The Volante, "In 1993, about four percent of American college students used prescription drugs for nonmedical uses, according...

Animal studies have raised concerns about SSRIs and ADHD stimulants inducing lasting abnormalities in the developing brain. Researchers from the University of Amsterdam are...

Like so many others, I have wanted to embrace the idea that research supports such beliefs as “ADHD is a chronic disease plaguing children”, and/or “Bigfoot exists”. I mean, who wouldn’t? We assume that research is based on sound evidence; information we can trust. Who wouldn't want to believe evidence that there is a simple medical explanation for those annoying behaviors exhibited by children in the process of developing into responsible young adults?

My last blog raised issues about the involvement of Shire Pharmaceuticals in lobbying for the inclusion of mandatory screening of children for ADHD in...