Over-Medicalization of Everyday Life

In DSM-IV, a “diagnosis” of major depressive disorder is based on the presence of a major depressive episode. A major depressive episode, in turn, is defined by the presence of five or more items from the following list during a two-week period: (1) depressed mood most of the day, nearly every day, as indicated by either subjective report (e.g., feels sad or empty) or observation made by others (e.g., appears tearful). Note: In children and adolescents, can be irritable mood. ...

Psychiatrists, when challenged about the massive increase in psychotropic drug prescriptions, sometimes point out that the bulk of this prescribing is done – not by them – but by primary care doctors (GPs). Although the psychiatrists’ claim in this regards may be true, it is also somewhat misleading. The “illnesses” for which these drugs are being prescribed were invented by psychiatrists, and it is these inventions that legitimize the prescribing activity. And, of course, as the psychiatrists invent more illnesses, the prescription rates increase proportionately. Without the perceived legitimacy of the DSM, GPs simply couldn’t dish out antidepressants, anxiolytics, and stimulants on the scale seen today, if for no other reason than the fear of lawsuits. ...

In the old days, which I well remember, misbehavior in school was considered a disciplinary problem. This included not paying attention, fidgeting, not applying oneself to one’s work, talking, interrupting the teacher, etc., etc., etc… Then the APA decided that these various activities were really symptoms of a mental illness, and thereby created the ever-burgeoning market for Ritalin and other drugs which, we are falsely told, correct the “chemical imbalance” in these children’s brains. ...

In DSM-IV, there is a category called Somatoform Disorders, the common feature of which is a preoccupation with “… physical symptoms that suggest a general medical condition …and are not fully explained by a general medical condition…” Four of the “diagnoses” in this category will be retired in DSM-5 and will be replaced by a new “diagnosis”: somatic symptom disorder. The four superseded “diagnoses” are: 1. somatization disorder 2. hypochondriasis 3. pain disorder 4. undifferentiated somatoform disorder. ...

I’ve mentioned Alice Keys before on this blog. She’s a psychiatrist who laments the fact that psychiatry has become virtually synonymous with drug pushing, and has expressed her concerns from time to time on Robert Whitaker’s Mad in America website. Alice has a new post up today, called Winners of the American Dream. You can see it here. She has decided to quit psychiatry. “Pills are the only thing left in psychiatry. So I stopped working.” ...

There’s a nice article at Involuntary Transformation on this topic. The author, Nathan, poses a very interesting question: since drugs cause damage to children and there are many better alternatives, why do so many parents choose the drug option? Nathan goes on to suggest that the reason lies in the effort that the pharmaceutical industry invests in marketing, and he calls for “…complete and total transparency in all Mental Health Services.” ...

The routine drugging of children for the ordinary problems of childhood is destructive for two reasons: firstly because of the toxic effects of the pharmaceutical products, and secondly because it conveys to the child the message that drugs are an acceptable way to deal with life’s problems. This latter kind of damage is graphically illustrated in a tragic NY Times article by Ted Gup. You can see it here. Ted is a fellow of the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard. ...

It is a central theme of this website that there are no mental illnesses/disorders, and that the psychiatric medicalization of ordinary human problems is arbitrary, spurious, and destructive. The widespread acceptance of ADHD as a mental illness/chemical imbalance has no scientific underpinning, but rather is based on marketing and promotion. The ADHD “diagnosis” is particularly destructive, in that it targets children, and serves as the justification for “treating” these children with dangerous drugs. ...

Today I received a short comment from Ruth Elliot on my post Psychiatric “Diagnoses” for Children. Ruth linked to an article by Claudia Gold, MD. Claudia is a Freudian psychoanalyst. My ideological orientation is behavioral, and if you were to ask people in this business: what is the opposite of a behaviorist? you would probably get the answer: a Freudian psychoanalyst. And vice versa. They are two very different ways of conceptualizing human activity. ...

Today, courtesy of Monica, I came across an article by Marilyn Wedge, PhD. It’s called Six Problems with Psychiatric Diagnosis for Children. You can read it here. Here are some quotes: "Psychiatric diagnoses contained in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders are not classified by causes like genuine medical diseases." "Perhaps worst of all, a child who has been labeled with a psychiatric diagnosis grows up believing that there is something wrong with her, that she is somehow “abnormal.” ...