Psycotropic Drugs Used in Children

A continue on the c only of psychedelic drugs drug vitiate to assert active pip-squeakren Lauren L. Dewar April 20, 2010 Introduction At el yet years of age, Thomas Edison was interpreted by of school because his teachers considered him difficult and he could non be taught. While in school Edisons mind oft eons wandered and his teacher was overheard calling him addled. A nonher denominate him as retarded. This ended his three months of decreed schooling. Because of this Thomass mother space schooled him and taught him math, reading, and writing. He wherefore went on to set push through i of the greatest inventors of all ms.In right aways find a bring back society Thomas Edison would prevail nigh definitely been put on the nowadays very popular medications Ritalin, Adderall, or Prozac. These argon mind-altering psychotropic drugs used to dole turn out Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Taking that into consideration, one might ask themselves that if Th omas had and then been put on these medications, would he motor stand of ever been capable of experimenting and discovering his great inventions? afterwards analyzing the data, this level depart make it produce that children should not be putd such(prenominal)(prenominal) mind altering medications to control their activeness.It give be ingest that these drugs arrive terrible abruptly and big-term side effectuate, sometimes even death. Through query it go away excessively be clear that in that location is no diagnosis for hyperkinetic syndrome and that the occlusivelist doctors go by to diagnose charge deficit roughness is not enough proof of a ailment that postulate to be medicated. This report includes intravenous feeding sections background information, my methodology, results of the deliberate, and conclusion and recommendations. Background schooling For starters, thither is no scientific floor for diagnosing minimal forefront damage.Often times it is the school direction or loving workers who ar patently not equipped to make affable health assessments making the ADHD diagnoses (Williams). Simply, if a child is observed to be playacting bored, distracted and/or boisterous in the classroom , he or she is much believed to be suffering from ADHD, as contrasted to suffering from, say, childhood (Williams). Recent reports send word a trend of increasing preponderance of psychotropic drug prescriptions among children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) however, reasons for change magnitude use of medications is unclear (Guevara).Through my interrogation I also institute that children as youthful as the age of both be beingness placed on these medications. So now the terrible twos is being replaced with children with lookal problems. The rest of my report will focus on statistics, short and long-term effects, and alternatives. I will also go over the history of the use of drugs to control child rens behavior. A shortened History Werry (1999) noted that the use of drugs to control childrens behavior is an old practice.From the use of brandy to soothe infants to other sedating drugs such as barbiturates and opiates, children pick out been administered psychotropic agents as long as such agents nonplus existed however, research on such practices dates only to the other(a) 20th century (Ingersoll). Methodology My methodology was mostly research though academician Search Complete. I researched articles on statistics, procedures, diagnoses, and psyche stories of real life people who keep dealt with these drugs and ADHD. I also researched drug bountiful alternatives to controlling ADHD or Hyperactivity in children. Results of Study 1.Studies show that it is estimated that between 6 million and 8 million children have been prescribed Ritalin to treat the shoot for over scientifically un be mental unsoundness called ADHD. This widespread doping in turn has increase c one timern that that school age children are being drugged to control their behavior (OMeara, Hyper-Drugging of Active Kids). I also found in my research that in 1985, in that location was an astonishing 500,000 cases. Not even quin years later that number jumped to 7,000,000. fit in to The Times, in the year 2000 close to 20 million prescriptions were written for ADD medicines like Ritalin (Null, 2001).Today, one in all thirty between the ages of 5 and 19 has a prescription of Ritalin. Believe it or not, the number of prescribed toddlers between ages 2 and 4 has doubled or even tripled since 1991. They have now replaced the terrible twos with children with behavioral problems. It is between the ages of 2 through 4 that the human maven goes through major maturing and developing stages. To have these children this teenage on these psychotropic drugs should raise up any rational looking parents, teachers, and doctors. 2. Unfortunately, if you think the statistics are expectant , the side effects are catastrophic.Through my studies I found that these side effects include decreased appetit, insomnia, anxiousness or fearfulness, irritability, decreased spontaneity, depression, headaches, stomach aches, tics (e. g. , twitches, jerks, blinks, and squints), skin rash, embarrassment, psychosis, and even fatal overdoses. They are also an premature training into drug addiction. Looking then at the risk of abuse potential drop for stimulants later in life, Fone and Nutt state that the oral, kind of than the intravenous, route of administration of methylphenidate limits abuse potential owing to lower bioavailability and increase (first-pass) metabolism (Leonard).So the question posed is wherefore parents would and schools want to imply the risks of these medications with their children? 3. Studies show that there is no actual diagnosis for ADHD. Fred Baughman, a child neurologist, researcher and staunch critic of ADHD diagnoses, tells cortical potential, It i s my duty as a doctor to know whether patients have a disease and whether previously rendered diagnoses, such as ADHD, are proven diseases. I have been unable to validate or register a disease or mark physical abnormality in children verbalise to have ADHD.Finding no objective physical abnormality, including a chemical one, means they have no disease they are physically, medically and neurologically normal (OMeara, Hyper-Drugging of Active Kids) Fig 1 Percentage of children who did and did not have ADHD and received pharmacy fills for nonstimulant psychotropic medications. every categories of medications between children who did and did not have ADHD were statistically significant (P < . 001) by ? sup2 test. The chance of nonstimulant use by category of neurobehavioral disorder was estimated (Table 3).Among children of the same category of age, gender, mental health service use, and non-ADHD disorder, children who were identified as having ADHD were more(prenominal) than liable(predicate) to receive TCAs (adjusted OR 12. 4 95% CI 7. 6-20. 3), SSRIs (adjusted OR 4. 3 95% CI 2. 7-6. 9), and alpha sympathomimetic agonists (adjusted OR 32. 0 95% CI 17. 3-59. 4) than were children who did not have ADHD. Similarly, children who had internalizing disorders were more likely to receive TCAs (adjusted OR 25. 3 95% CI 6. 1-104. ) and SSRIs (adjusted OR 75. 2 95% CI 26. 7-211. 7) than were children who did not have internalizing disorders. peasantren who had tic disorders were more likely to receive alpha adrenergic agonists (adjusted OR 215. 2 95% CI 21. 5-2157. 9) (Guevara) . Implications of Results subsequently researching the use of the psychotropic drugs in children, it is clear that it is not rubber eraser. Parents, counselors, and social workers need to research and start to kick the buckether to find safe alternatives to dealing with their active children.The studies have proven the dangers of these medications and the guidelines for the ability t o prescribe such medications. end superman & group A Recommendations * I would recommend that the Child Advocacy Center and social workers take more time figuring out the real psychological problems of these children and deal with them more through counseling and mentoring. A cumulation of these childrens problems or neediness comes from unstable homes and in use(p) parents who dont take the time to spend extra time with their children. These children are just simply reaching out for attention and love.They act out as a way to get attention not realizing that the attention they are receiving because of it is bad attention. This is not their fault after all they are just children. It is us parents, teachers, counselors and social workers who must(prenominal) teach them the differences between commodity attention and bad attention. And them as children should not have to fight, beg, or act out for attention. I would also recommend that the parents get their children more involved in extra-curricular activities so that they can release some the life force naturally and gain confidence.A change in diet could also work, less starting line and more health foods. I also believe that the parents should spend more time with their children so that their children can gain the notion of self worthiness and respect. One support recommendation I would like to point out is that the courts and higher authority get more involved in such cases and put a limitation to the prescribing of these baneful drugs and to the ages to which they are prescribed. * This study clearly shows how arthritic it can be to put your child on these psychotropic drugs.With a teensy more effort as a society we can raise our children to be national leaders and teach them how to expatiate for success. Sedating active children is absolutely not the answer. This study also clearly shows that there needs to be a more legit FDA canonical way to diagnose ADHD and to prescribe medications is the re is such a disease. With applied science today it should be easy for scientists to come up with some sort of brain scan or blood check to determine such cases.We as adults must take into consideration that these children who are being highly medicated at such young ages, are going to be the children who take care of us as elders. What will the future be to us and to them once they become our doctors, nurses, bankers, etc? What will our future hold for us if we dont manipulate the problems at hand now and compass point drugging our children? We must let them be children and stop sedating them because we are too spry or too lazy to let them be children. AppendixWorks Cited Guevara, James. Psychotropic Medication Use in a Population of Children Who Have Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. (2002) 1. Leonard, Henrietta L. , M. D. Child & Adolescent Psychopharmacology UPDATE. Stimulants, Development and Substance shout 7. 5 (2005) 3. Null, Gary. The Drugging of Our Child ren. (2001). OMeara, Kelly Patricia. Hyper-Drugging of Active Kids. Insight on the impertinents (2001) 1-3. Plasker, Eric H. Todays Chiropractic. (1997) 1-5. Williams, Armstrong. The Drugging of America. New York Amsterdam News (2004) 1-2.