Tag: metabolic effects

Adults in the U.S. diagnosed with “serious mental illness” die on average 25 years earlier than others. This is not controversial, as establishment psychiatry and its critics agree. What is controversial is who is to blame?

We know that all drugs have side effects. That’s just part of the deal right? But is it really possible that an antidepressant can cause a sane person to act like a cold-blooded criminal?

Peter Gøtzsche’s new book, Deadly Psychiatry and Organized Denial brings up an important and complex  issue.  How do psychiatrists get up in the morning and damage people all day long while pretending to help them?  The book is elegantly referenced – and I encourage everyone who practices thoughtful psychiatry to read it, because you need to be much better educated to practice high-quality mental health than you do to act as a dispensing machine.  Gøtzsche is absolutely right; on all levels psychiatrists are in denial about the damage that they are doing to patients.

Risperdal is increasingly used in nursing homes for “agitation,” especially on those suffering from some form of dementia, even when no hallucinations or delusions are observed. Risperdal has quite a long list of side effects including heart problems, metabolic difficulties, diabetes, involuntary movements, agitation, flat affect and sedation. Risperdal has earned a “black box" warning that its use in those with Alzheimer's increases the risk of earlier death. Yet its use in Alzheimer's patients in nursing homes is extremely common.