This lovely bit appeared in my email today. I thought i should share it with the rest of you. It seemed like something that shouldn’t be ignored.
Re: Overmedicating for ADHD, March/April, 2009, p 8-9.
To the Dr. Brey,
Please publish the following:
Neurology Now asks: “Does your child have difficulty staying focused, sitting still, or finishing a task? If so, he or she could be one of the three- to five-percent of school-age children who are diagnosed each year with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).” There is no such reality. If your child has difficulty staying focused, sitting still, or finishing a task, and that is all they have, the fact of the matter is that he or she is medically, physically normal. If they have been labeled ADHD, that label stays with them found throughout their school and medical history. If they are made to take dangerous, addictive schedule II psychostimulants or other psychiatric drugs, you and your child are victims of the biggest health care fraud in history—calling ADHD and all things mental, psychological, psychiatric “chemical imbalances,” “disorders,” “diseases” of the brain—for profit.
Recently I assisted Mr. Brian Verbeek, Canadian father of a multiply “diagnosed,” “drugged,” 12 year-old boy write an inquiry to Health Canada on this point. The letter he got back, dated November 10, 2008 read:
“For mental/psychiatric disorders in general, including depression, anxiety, schizophrenia and ADHD, there are no confirmatory gross, microscopic or chemical abnormalities that have been validated for objective physical diagnosis. Rather, diagnoses of possible mental conditions are described strictly in terms of patterns of symptoms that tend to cluster together.”
Having written the same inquiry to director of the FDA, Andrew C. von Eschenbach, MD, I heard back from Donald Dobbs of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) who consulted their new drug review division and replied:
“…they concurred with the response you enclosed from Health Canada. Psychiatric disorders (as Health Canada refers) are diagnosed based on a patient’s presentation of symptoms that the larger psychiatric community has come to accept as real and responsive to treatment. We have nothing more to add to Health Canada’s response.”
It is clear that psychiatry’s market strategy is to invent diagnoses out of thin air and call them diseases—with such “diseases” being their excuse to prescribe drugs. Psychiatry has thus surrendered their legitimacy and morality. Neurologists, with diagnosis their primary duty, should not follow suit. Nor should any physician.
Sincerely,
Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD
Thank you Dr. Baughman, for being an honest human being.
Interesting answer no?
Oh i know all about what schools do to motivate their kids. My husband is finnish. There is no better school system presently in the world. And i have been fortunate enough to hear and read all about it. American systems could learn alot from it.
And maybe i will pick up The Talent Code because it sounds like an interesting read. Would love to hear a bit more about it?