Thread: US FDA questions heart risk findings on ADHD drugs

ADHD diagnoses on the rise
3:30 AM 04/02/2013

New data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reveal that 11 percent of American school-age children have received a medical diagnosis of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), prompting concerns among doctors that the condition is being over-diagnosed, The New York Times reports.

ADHD means that abnormal chemical levels in the brain impair a person’s ability to control impulses and focus. It is considered a chronic condition that continues into adulthood.

Overall, 6.4 million young Americans between the ages of 4 and 17 have received an ADHD diagnosis in their lifetime. This marks a 16 percent increase since 2007, and a 53 percent increase in the last decade.

Two-thirds of diagnosed children have prescriptions for stimulants like Ritalin, Adderall, Concerta and Vyvanse. These stimulants can aid in concentration; however, they can also lead to addiction, anxiety and psychosis.

Sales of these stimulants have more than doubled to $9 billion in 2012 — up from $4 billion in 2007, according to IMS Health. “Mild symptoms are being diagnosed so readily, which goes well beyond the disorder and beyond the zone of ambiguity to pure enhancement of children who are otherwise healthy,” said Doctor William Gaf, a professor at the Yale School of Medicine.

Because the American Psychiatric Association intends to broaden the definition of ADHD, it is likely that even more Americans will receive diagnoses. The test for the disorder is completely subjective. The diagnosis is determined after speaking with patients, parents and teachers about the child’s behavior, and ruling out other causes.

Some doctors say the new rates imply that millions of children are taking the medication to enhance their performance in school. Universities are often settings for the illegal sharing and selling of drugs like Adderall. An ADHD diagnosis has become synonymous with a shortcut to better grades, according to some experts.

According to data compiled by the New York Times from a CDC study, nearly one in five school-age boys have received an ADHD diagnosis, compared to one in fourteen girls. About one in 10 high-school boys takes ADHD medication.

Taxpayers bear the burden for children covered by Medicaid, who receive ADHD diagnoses at a rate one-third higher than the rest of the population, according to CDC data.

Proposed changes to the wording in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders include expanding the timeframe in which symptoms must appear to age 12 rather than 7, adding example behaviors such as repeatedly losing one’s cellphone and requiring that symptoms “impact” rather than “impair” daily functioning.

Ned Hallowell, a child psychiatrist and author of books on the disorder, called the use of ADHD drugs as “mental steroids” dangerous.
“I think now’s the time to call attention to the dangers that can be associated with making the diagnosis in a slipshod fashion,” he said.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/04/02/ad...#ixzz2PKQhXZXv

I have seen kids as young as THREE "diagnosed" with ADHD. That is stupid.

ADHD Does Not Exist. But Psychosis and Even Sudden Death Caused by ADHD Meds Is Very Real

The 700% increase in psychostimulant medication throughout the 90’s should raise several questions about the instance, diagnosis, and treatment of children with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). What should also cause a debate is the fact that Shawn Cooper, Eric Harris, T.J. Solomon, Kip Kinkel, Mitchel Johnson, and Andrew Golden all have two things in common. The first piece of common ground that we can find between these children is the fact that all of them brought weapons to school and shot and killed fellow students.

The second commonality is the fact that all of these children were on Ritalin or some other form of psychotropic. In fact most public mass shootings in the last two decades, including school, college, and even army bases involves the shooter being on or withdrawing from a psychopharmaceutical.

These are some startling facts but should come as no surprise. One can simply read the inserts of the drugs themselves to see that the side effects include things like restlessness, hallucinations, unusual behavior, or motor tics. The inserts also warn against long term use and the dangers of quick withdraw of medication. Most of these drugs are prescribed over long periods of time.

What’s also startling is why so many parents accept prescriptions for an amphetamine or psychotropic that has an increased risk of cancer, chromosomal damage, psychosis, shrinkage of the brain, and even the possibility to worsen the exact symptoms that the drug is supposed to suppress.

The FDA lists a plethora of warnings, called Black Box Warnings, that cite the increased risk of anxiety, agitation, panic attacks, insomnia, irritability, hostility, impulsivity, akathisia (severe restlessness), hypomania, mania, and suicide, yet it is completely acceptable for someone to give these to their four year old.

Thankfully some experts are starting to raise concerns and pose questions about this full on assault on children by the medical industrial complex. According to a report in The New York Post, after a long career treating patients complaining of such problems as short attention spans and an inability to focus, neurologist, Richard Saul is convinced that ADHD is a collection of symptoms, not a disease, and shouldn’t be listed in the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual.

Dr. Saul has written about the misdiagnosis in his forthcoming book, “ADHD Does Not Exist: The Truth About Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder” (HarperWave), which is sure to cause controversy when it comes out in next month.

“ADHD makes a great excuse,” Saul notes. “The diagnosis can be an easy-to-reach-for crutch. Moreover, there’s an attractive element to an ADHD diagnosis, especially in adults — it can be exciting to think of oneself as involved in many things at once, rather than stuck in a boring rut.”

Echoing Dr Saul’s views, a group of researchers from Australia and the Netherlands said in November that the diagnosis of ADHD may have become too broad.

A wider classification of symptoms for ADHD in the psychiatric ‘bible’ used by the profession has led to a steep rise in diagnosis and prescriptions for medication, the study warned.

This is not the first time skepticism to ADHD has been brought to the forefront. A study published in the Journal of Health Economics in 2010, determined that about 20 percent of children have likely been misdiagnosed with the supposed disorder. That’s nearly 1 million children in the United States alone who fit one of the broad range of symptoms and is consequently put on a regimen of psychoactive medication.

Skepticism is exactly what needs to be applied to this dilemma. We know for certain that these drugs can be extremely harmful and are linked to unimaginable atrocity.

It is time we, as a society, start to question this prescription drug epidemic before we turn Aldous Huxley’s dystopian Brave New World, into reality.

“If we could sniff or swallow something that would, for five or six hours each day, abolish our solitude as individuals, atone us with our fellows in a glowing exaltation of affection and make life in all its aspects seem not only worth living, but divinely beautiful and significant, and if this heavenly, world-transfiguring drug were of such a kind that we could wake up next morning with a clear head and an undamaged constitution-then, it seems to me, all our problems (and not merely the one small problem of discovering a novel pleasure) would be wholly solved and earth would become paradise.”

–Aldous Huxley

http://thefreethoughtproject.com/adh...lL2VmUHbjBs.99