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Psychiatric Drug Facts via breggin.com :
“Most psychiatric drugs can cause withdrawal reactions, sometimes including life-threatening emotional and physical withdrawal problems… Withdrawal from psychiatric drugs should be done carefully under experienced clinical supervision.” Dr. Peter Breggin
Jun 16, 2012
Jun 15, 2012
What if you left a mental patient in a hot car? Would anyone care?
![](https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-LZdxjlaqABE/TiR-hIsVslI/AAAAAAAAJHE/IJnl092ZbTE/s144-p/20090716-_MG_2495.jpg)
guest post written by Juli Lawrence, long time Civil Rights activist and psychiatric survivor:
One of my favorite tools in social science research has always been content analysis, because it can show the media's point of view on a subject. Since the public tends to buy into whatever the mainstream media tells them, it's a good source of recognizing popular views and knowledge of a subject.
Nearly every year, parts of the US endure deadly heat waves, and the media does a good job of putting out warnings. Except in the case of psychiatric patients on psych drugs, who are at high risk, along with the senior population. The media also does a good job of reminding people that pets are at risk as well.
Most years, I send out a well-composed press release to major media, asking that they specifically mention the dangers to psychiatric patients. And to date, they have completely ignored this very real medical emergency. As has the government.
So to borrow the words of Kanye West, "Weathermen don't care about persons with psychiatric issues." (Or more bluntly, "Kent Ehrhardt and friends don't care about crazy people.")
Now to the content analysis, which does not follow the strict standards of statistical methods. It's simply a quick look into the media's warnings about the current heat wave, and who matters.
Using Google News, the term "heat wave," and searching from July 15 to July 20, 2011, 9,259 article results are returned.
Using the same date parameters and adding the term "elderly," 1,579 articles are returned. When the term "psychiatric" is put in place of "elderly," two results appear, although one is discounted because the result has two unrelated stories on the same page (the heat wave, and a story about the child murder in New York).
The only newspaper that mentions psychiatric is the Burlington (North Carolina) Times News:
"Some medications make people more susceptible to the heat-related problems. People who take diuretics or certain cholinergic and psychiatric medications will be more sensitive to issues related to dehydration."
Changing the term "psychiatric" to "mental" brings up 235 results during the same five-day period, but most of the articles used the word mental in a way other than warning mental patients to be careful in the heat. Four articles included persons with mental illness in the list of high risk populations.
If media coverage is consistent, then the reporting of the death toll in the days ahead will include absolutely no mention of the persons who died thanks to psychiatric drugs, heat and a lack of knowledge. The media's silence will continue because this population is a devalued group of human beings.
Note: Google results change regularly, so these results are not static.
I'd like to thank Juli giving me permission to post this important article.
More information on neuroleptic drugs risk for inducing heatstroke:
first posted 7-21-2011
Jun 14, 2012
The DSM 5 Controversy Update
Update April 2, 2013 apparently, Psychiatric Times disabled every link sometime recently. One wonders on their motivation to disable links that had been functional for so long...
I recently read, "Inside the Battle to Define Mental Illness," an interview with Allen Francis, M.D., lead author of the DSM IV, and an outspoken critic of the current effort to update the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, the DSM 5. My hat's off to Dr. Francis for having the professional integrity to assertively state his case.
via The Psychiatric Times:
A Warning Sign on the Road to DSM-V: Beware of Its Unintended Consequences
By Allen Frances, MD | June 26, 2009
Dr Frances was chair of the DSM-IV Task Force and of the department of psychiatry at Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, NC. He is currently professor emeritus at Duke.
"We should begin with full disclosure. As head of the DSM-IV Task Force, I established strict guidelines to ensure that changes from DSM-III-R to DSM-IV would be few and well supported by empirical data. Please keep this history in mind as you read my numerous criticisms of the current DSM-V process. It is reasonable for you to wonder whether I have an inherently conservative bias or am protecting my own DSM-IV baby. I feel sure that I am identifying grave problems in the DSM-V goals, methods, and products, but it is for the reader to judge my objectivity."
via Wired Magazine:
Excerpts from The Battle to Define Mental Illness, an interview with Dr. Allen Francis:
"Then an odd, reflective look crosses his face, as if he’s taking in the strangeness of this scene: Allen Frances, lead editor of the fourth edition of the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (universally known as the DSM-IV), confessing that “these concepts are virtually impossible to define precisely with bright lines at the boundaries.” For the first time in two days, the conversation comes to an awkward halt."
"But he recovers quickly, and back in the living room he finishes explaining why he came out of a seemingly contented retirement to launch a bitter and protracted battle with the people, some of them friends, who are creating the next edition of the DSM. And to criticize them not just once, and not in professional mumbo jumbo that would keep the fight inside the professional family, but repeatedly and in plain English, in newspapers and magazines and blogs. And to accuse his colleagues not just of bad science but of bad faith, hubris, and blindness, of making diseases out of everyday suffering and, as a result, padding the bottom lines of drug companies. These aren’t new accusations to level at psychiatry, but Frances used to be their target, not their source. He’s hurling grenades into the bunker where he spent his entire career." read it here.
When I read the APA's response to Allen Francis' criticism in the Psychiatric Times, I was unimpressed. Francis begins his criticism with the statement, "We should begin with full disclosure." The APA's rebuttal was signed by four psychiatrists and was a lame attempt to defend the indefensible. An advertisement for Abilify was alongside of it:
Explore results from Study 3, including the primary and key secondary measures.1,2
![Watch Dr. Stahl review the LATUDA Clinical Trials](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_tIFRB1Q5DOf2gv9mtMPLt28teBNd00p6PcQ8yIWlZxWIo38x3DgwkjoZ854fnAAqSlJc5p4VJrIDtkzEkdBX5pNUq-SPsGFy2eXajyB5CLDKfYOoD2uuSXZtpkvgHAsLBR2y7E=s0-d)
Before I was done updating this article, the advertisement was changed to one for Seroquel...I must say, it is more than a little disconcerting to have so much advertising of the neuroleptic drugs in professional journals. It is just as disturbing, if not more so, than the amount of direct to consumer marketing of psychiatric drugs. It is particularly troubling to see so much reliance on pharmaceutical industry funding for psychiatric journals, and the functioning of the APA itself. It doesn't seem ethical to have Direct to Professional marketing for psychiatric drugs in "professional literature." There is no way in hell that these marketing messages do not feed any existent biases a professional may have.
6-14-2012 When updating this article, I discovered the page with the APA's rebuttal had an even larger advertisement for Latuda, that takes you to another page:
Before I was done updating this article, the advertisement was changed to one for Seroquel...I must say, it is more than a little disconcerting to have so much advertising of the neuroleptic drugs in professional journals. It is just as disturbing, if not more so, than the amount of direct to consumer marketing of psychiatric drugs. It is particularly troubling to see so much reliance on pharmaceutical industry funding for psychiatric journals, and the functioning of the APA itself. It doesn't seem ethical to have Direct to Professional marketing for psychiatric drugs in "professional literature." There is no way in hell that these marketing messages do not feed any existent biases a professional may have.
It is no secret that Conflicts of Interest, fraud and corruption have permeated every aspect of psychiatry for some time. In the real world, some psychiatrists have caused a great deal harm to human beings they meant to help. The societal damage has wide-ranging effects, and a negative impact on ALL of US. Why is the APA (and the AACAP) allowing become and it originates with the criminal enterprise that conflicted academic psychopharmacology researchers involved themselves in; intentionally or not. This criminal enterprise continues to defraud all of us through publicly funded programs, and continues to harm patients. In spite of this reality, many psychiatrists do not seem to understand that even if they themselves did not perpetrate any fraud themselves, they have an ethical obligation to have psychiatrists who have, held accountable. It is obviously in everyone's best interest for professional groups to hold their individual members to high ethical standards. It seems to me that unethical conduct has not only been accepted; it has been richly rewarded and honored...
My final observation is this: The APA will conceivably make a great deal of money from the DSM 5. It is preposterous and disingenuous for it's members to suggest a loss of income is motivating Allen Francis; yet failing to mention the anticipated income expected by the American Psychiatric Association with publication of the DSM 5. Psychiatrists who are critical of the APA, have been maligned; and have had their careers dramatically altered. Psychiatrists are punished for being ethical, having integrity and defending their work, i.e. showing all of the data generated, the procedures and parameters used. Such overt ethical integrity is punished in the APA; a person may be forced to defend themselves against malicious attacks and/or ostracized. APA thugs are not even censured.
Psychiatrists that are critical of any aspect of this process, that speak out about the harm caused patients; and that question the secretive process and the lack of validity are castigated. The professionals with the integrity to publicly express disagreement or dissent are said to be impaired or lacking insight by "Key Opinion Leaders" of the APA. The psychopharmachology faithful in the APA have let loose a contagion that has spawned an epidemic of Pharmachosis. Psychiatrists with Pharmachosis have ansognosia; and don't even know it. When experiencing Pharmachosis, a psychiatrist doesn't know what they have, or what they don't have, and they don't even know if they have or have not... (◔‿◔) Completely oblivious to a quantifiable reality recognized by anyone without Pharmachosis, i.e. having a modicum of critical thinking skills.
Alert to the Research Community—Be Prepared to Weigh in on DSM-V
Setting the record straight Schaztberg Scully Kupfer Regier
APA and DSM: Empty Promises Spitzer
A Response to the Charge of Financial Motivation
Criticism vs. Fact William Carpenter
Dr Frances Responds to Dr Carpenter: A Sharp Difference of Opinion
Advice to DSM-V . . . Change Deadlines and Text, Keep Criteria Stable
Advice to DSM-V: Integrate with ICD-11
Alert to the Research Community—Be Prepared to Weigh in on DSM-V
Setting the record straight Schaztberg Scully Kupfer Regier
APA and DSM: Empty Promises Spitzer
A Response to the Charge of Financial Motivation
Criticism vs. Fact William Carpenter
Dr Frances Responds to Dr Carpenter: A Sharp Difference of Opinion
Advice to DSM-V . . . Change Deadlines and Text, Keep Criteria Stable
Advice to DSM-V: Integrate with ICD-11
The Drugging of U.S. Troops
via NextGov:
ARMY WARNS DOCTORS AGAINST USING CERTAIN DRUGS IN PTSD TREATMENTThe Army Surgeon General's office is backing away from its long-standing endorsement of prescribing troops multiple highly addictive psychotropic drugs for the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder and early this month warned regional medical commanders against using tranquilizers such as Xanax and Valium to treat PTSD.
An April 10 policy memo that the Army Medical Command released regarding the diagnosis and treatment of PTSD said a class of drugs known as benzodiazepines, which include Xanax and Valium, could intensify rather than reduce combat stress symptoms and lead to addiction.
The memo, signed by Herbert Coley, civilian chief of staff of the Army Medical Command, also cautioned service clinicians against prescribing second-generation antipsychotic drugs, such as Seroquel and Risperidone, to combat PTSD. The drugs originally were developed to treat severe mental conditions such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. The memo questioned the efficacy of this drug class in PTSD treatment and cautioned against their use due to potential long-term health effects, which include heart disorders, muscle spasms and weight gain.
Throughout more than a decade of war in Afghanistan and Iraq, the military services have relied heavily on prescription drugs to help troops deal with their mental health problems during and after deployment. In a June 2010 report, the Defense Department's Pharmacoeconomic Center said 213,972, or 20 percent of the 1.1 million active-duty troops surveyed, were taking some form of psychotropic drug -- antidepressants, antipsychotics, sedative hypnotics or other controlled substances.
The Army, in a July 2010 report on suicide prevention, said one-third of all active-duty military suicides involved prescription drugs.
Jun 13, 2012
Lost in Translational Science: Anosognosia Due to Pharmacosis
via NIMH Director's Blog:
Experimental Medicine
By Thomas Insel on June 12, 2012
an couple excerpts:
"Existing antidepressants and antipsychotics have many proposed molecular targets, but none that have been shown to be necessary or sufficient for their clinical effects.
Amazingly, after three decades of broad use of these medications, we still don’t know how they work when they are effective.
Psychopharmacology is, and always has been "experimental medicine." It is not Evidence-Based. Now, the director of NIMH is stating, "antidepressant effects have variously been proposed to involve changes in serotonin neurotransmission, hippocampal cell birth, and changes in stress hormones, among many other effects. By ruling out some targets and focusing on those involved in the biology of the disorder, we can direct treatment development much more efficiently."
What is Thomas Insel smoking? A pathophysiological disease process causing depression has not been identified. Belief that depression is caused by an unidentified biological disease, is not 'evidence' validating a hypothesis. Without identifying a disease and it's pathophysiology; how could anyone hope to identify a treatment target? Let me guess: the target will be identified after a drug's mechanism of action is identified.
This strategy never has worked out very well.
What 1 Boring Old Man had to say about Thomas Insel and this blog post, New Directions:
He believes what he thinks is the truth. At Yerkes, he was not reappointed Director after five years – largely because the staff didn’t want him back. He was toodirective. He took the term Director literally and tried to channel the direction there too vigorously. Now he’s doing the same thing at the NIMH. I gather he genuinely believes that the future direction for mental health is in newer, more effective medications. Under his direction, he’s incentivised this goal and micromanaged the direction of research efforts.
The argument he makes in this blog could’ve been made at any point in the history of psychiatry, but he presents it with a messianic sense of urgency and priority. His job at the National Institute of Mental Health is to create an environment that shepherds our best and brightest minds to follow their scientific instincts, not Tom Insel’s. Like his colleagues on the APA’s DSM-5 Task Force, he’s trying to hold on to a paradigm that is in a phase of exhaustion, now bordering on toxic. It’s a time for consolidation, for reflection, for stepping back and contemplating. It’s a time for new directions, and a new Director at the National Institute of Mental Health… here
Jun 12, 2012
The Politics of Memory
Labels:
Common Ground,
Consumer,
History,
Mental Health,
Pat Deegan,
Psychiatry,
Survivor
Report Details What Should Happen When Scientists at FDA Disagree
via the Union of Concerned Scientists:
![FDA medical device engineer](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_vbJrMK9Fz2LKJdQEA3OUG99QUtRz3uHcmuINsRhZiYQ-jcuGpwcjC-hkG0TO-57wd610mEnroLyZ8kDKXiNpwsJUhsERMqyQ9U1Bu9F-Jp35EQzPaeJmMWoQJdA1qKzHn7sH-FZ_M=s0-d)
New Report Details What Should Happen When Scientists at FDA Disagree
June 5, 2012
Should scientists at the Food and Drug Administration be able to have honest disputes with their colleagues about the science behind a drug or medical device approval decision? Or should they keep quiet about their concerns, preferring not to rock the boat?
Encouragingly, a government report released today details steps the agency will take to allow the FDA staff who work on medical devices to better resolve scientific disagreements. But sadly, I fear that the pressure to fast track drug and medical device approvals may discourage researchers from voicing dissenting scientific opinions.
There’s certainly a lot of work to be done. A recent UCS survey of FDA scientists found that 244 respondents (including 39 scientists at CDRH, the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health) felt they could not “openly express any concerns about the mission-driven work of their agency without fear of retaliation.”
That’s no surprise. In the past, we have seen scientific disputes ruin careers. We have also witnessed cases—like Vioxx—where reviewers who raise concerns about a drug or device’s safety and effectiveness face threats and retaliation.
Today’s ReportIn October 2009, CDRH put forward new policies and procedures for taking care of scientific disagreements among staff related to regulatory decisions. The Department of Health and Human Services Inspector General (IG) was asked to evaluate the effectiveness of the new policies and procedures.
An FDA engineer measures the magnetic fields emitted by a magnetic resonance imaging simulator used in testing MRI compatible medical devices. Photo credit: Food and Drug Administration
The IG found several challenges regarding implementation: the disagreement documentation and resolution process, awareness of employees on the policies and procedures, general confusion about regulatory definitions and processes, and “staff perceptions about expressing differences of opinion.” He recommended that FDA better train reviewers and managers, better define of the process for documenting and resolving scientific disagreements, and better define who is responsible for adequate documentation.
Other Improvements Regarding Scientific DisagreementsThe FDA’s new scientific integrity policy also takes some steps forward in resolving dissenting scientific opinions. The policy contains the following language:
“Scientific Dispute Resolution at FDA” (Staff Manual Guide (“SMG”) 9010.1) requires the agency’s organizational units to establish processes for resolving scientific disputes. These processes must include, among other things: key messages that employees are encouraged to voice scientific disagreements and that they are protected from retaliation and repercussions for raising such disagreements within their organization; a requirement that the head of the organization render a written decision if the dispute cannot be resolved at a lower level; and appropriate timeframes. The agency-wide SMG also provides a mechanism for employees to elevate scientific disputes to the Office of the Commissioner. An Agency Dispute Process Review Board, chaired by the agency’s Chief Scientist, is then responsible for conducting full and fair evaluations of the disputes to evaluate whether the appropriate processes were followed, whether the decisions made were based on consideration of all relevant evidence and views bearing on the scientific question at issue, and whether the initiating employee was provided an opportunity to express his or her concerns at all appropriate levels.
This is strong language. The policy should go even further, however, by requiring the documentation and public disclosure of dissenting opinions so that we can understand all of the science that was relied upon in making a drug or medical device approval decision. Our line-by-line analysis of the FDA policy is here.
Read the rest here: New Report Details What Should Happen When Scientists at FDA Disagree
photo via sweetmelissa50 on photobucket
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