Children outpacing the elderly in pharmaceutical consumption

from here:

"The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that in 2002 almost 20 percent of office visits to pediatricians were for psychosocial problems -- eclipsing both asthma and heart disease. That same year the Food and Drug Administration reported that some 10.8 million prescriptions were dispensed for children -- they are beginning to outpace the elderly in the consumption of pharmaceuticals."

One of the comments underneath:

"I've heard tell tthat in some school districts parents have no option. If they want their kids in the public schools, they must give them the behavior control medication."

Doping the kyds up rather than teaching them social skills and good behavior will only cause the problem to worsen, as all of us are aware. Pretty soon the one or two classrooms that used to be for "special ed" are going to be common for the "non psychotic" kyds as normal kyds are slowly becoming the minority. These breeders are turning what once were probably "normal" kyds into little sociopaths and now they are drugged up socio paths or anti social types. This so reminds me of one of the spin off movies from The Invasion of the Body Snatchers where the parents drugged their misbehaving, yet normal, kyds up and turned them into murderous zombies. Sometimes I feel like I am living inside of a sci fi movie, but Pleasantville it ain't.

"I've heard tell tthat in some school districts parents have no option. If they want their kids in the public schools, they must give them the behavior control medication."


This person "heard tell" wrong! It was made VERY clear to teachers in my district that you are NEVER allowed to ask parunts directly about their children's medical conditions. It violates their privacy. Most parunts will volunteer information about their children's health. There are those who are PNB who have children with real health problems who want to make sure the teachers know what's going on. The others, who are more than willing to talk about Bratley's condition, are usually breeders wanting paperwork filled out for their doctor so they can get their almighty benefits.

We were also told that we may NEVER suggest to a parunt that their child needs medication. We aren't medical professionals and aren't allowed to give medical advice. The most we can do, when we see a child who has obvious problems, is suggest that the parunt discuss their child's difficulty at school with their peditrician at their next visit.

The person who wrote this comment is obviously one of those people with bad kids or grandkids who likes to blame everything on the school system.

I predict that this problem will only increase because many parents either don't know or don't care about the proper way to discipline and raise children. There is one HELL of a problem when 20% of children are being medicated Sure there are times when medication is useful and appropriate, but I'm certain that not one in five kids needs meds!

The sad thing is that normal kids are going to suffer in all this. They're either going to end up in segregated classrooms, as mentioned above, or they are gong to be stuck in an environment that is not conducive to leaning.

Well, I'm sure this will work out really well when these kids are no longer on their parents insurance and have to find some way to pay for their meds themselves. And when they fail...delightful delightful withdrawal and society WINS.
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"It truly is the one commonality that every designation of humans you can think of has, there's at least one asshole."
--Me

married with rabbits Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> We live in a new hypochondriac society. This
> society WANTS to be sick, WANTS to be medicated.
> Because it's trendy, because it gives them excuses
> at work and why they have a shitty personality,
> because they get $$ for their children being
> diagnosed.
>
> My husband has had an FMLA claim for the past year
> and whenever he talks about it to other employees
> there, they think he's lucky! They say, 'I wish I
> had something wrong with me so that I could miss
> work.'


OMG that is so true, especially the part where they think people who are out with a true illness or injury are "lucky". It beats all I have ever seen in my life and I have seen a great deal of it around here the past two years. These people WANT to get hurt on the job and get 2/3 of their pay via worker's comp. They don't stop and think that IF they are truly injured, and believe me worker's comp insurance companies DEMAND there is compelling medical evidence of an on the job injury before they pay out, that they could be PERMANENTLY disabled, in constant pain, and unable to do ANYTHING, ever, much less work. After 12 weeks, people who are out sick for any reason can lose their job, they can be dropped from the group health insurance all together, or opt for cobra which can run $800+ a month.

It takes a lazy, ignorant person with ZERO ambition to be envious of people who are out sick or injured, or are being medicated for an illness and have to miss work. MY GOD people can be so damned sorry.

kidlesskim Wrote:
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> Doping the kyds up rather than teaching them
> social skills and good behavior will only cause
> the problem to worsen, as all of us are aware.

Yes! C'mon, we all remember when kids went more or less unmedicated, right? One kid in every class would rock back and forth in his chair throughout class, and maybe another would smell of pee regularly. But they knew what was expected of them and would behave accordingly.

I wish I had an official source for this -- I will check around for it -- but there is a rather shameful but interesting example of how to control psychotics without medication. The medical profession are aware of this and clinically interested in it, although it clearly isn't a great method. There's a well-documented case of a husband whose wife is or was a diagnosed but untreated schitzo. She'd kick off an episode every couple of weeks. Thing is, he's crack her one round the head and tell her to can the crazy talk every time she'd start one of her wierdnesses. Guess what. She would immediately supress that nonsense and snap back to normal for a few weeks. Then she'd kick off again, and he'd smack her and tell her to stop, and she would.

This can be applied to brats, is my point. They start eating their own turds or something, you do not call a psychiatrist. You slap them stupid, make them sort themselves out, and demand that they behave. Call me naive, but I'd bet they would behave.

- - - - - - - -
"The death of creativity is a pram in the hallway"
- Cyril Connolly

It's not that I don't understand that there are cases of mental illness, or whatever they are calling it these days, that require medication. However, I think that since they started qualifying for a monthly check when their kyds have most any disorder be it ADD/ADHD/Autism Spectrum/ODD/Bipolar, etc.......that a lot more kids have been diagnosed and medicated for the sole purpose of getting the money, when it was unnecessary. I also know that a cat or dog can be trained to do (or not do) most anything in order to live within a home alongside humans. Presumably, even a mentally retarded child, which most of these are not, has a higher IQ than the average pet. A human also has reasoning ability regardless of mental illness or retardation. Unless his case is rare and quite severe, a child SHOULD be able to learn not to smear his shit on the walls, grab people, or otherwise exhibit anti-social behavior.

I think that behavior modification can be taught to most any child regardless of his "condition", unless it is quite severe. I know a woman with a sure anough Autistic child in the classic sense. He is truly and nearly completely inside his own mind and bangs his head to the point he has to wear a helmet, screams and yells incessantly, doesn't want to be touched, and has to wear diapers most of the time and he is 8y/o. These cases are rare in comparison to the kyds who are diagnosed with Autism SPECTRUM disorder. From what I have seen, true Autism and this new "Autism Spectrum" are as different as the common cold is to the Ebola virus. People who abuse the system and drug their kids rather than disipline them and act like that some of these trumped up "disorders" are the real thing, only hurt people like the little boy I just mentioned who are truly afflicted and in need of special education and care.

BratBgone said, excerpted:

" 'I've heard tell that in some school districts parents have no option. If they want their kids in the public schools, they must give them the behavior control medication.'

"This person 'heard tell' wrong! It was made VERY clear to teachers in my district that you are NEVER allowed to ask parunts directly about their children's medical conditions. It violates their privacy....

"We were also told that we may NEVER suggest to a parunt that their child needs medication. We aren't medical professionals and aren't allowed to give medical advice. The most we can do, when we see a child who has obvious problems, is suggest that the parunt discuss their child's difficulty at school with their pediatrician at their next visit.

"The person who wrote this comment is obviously one of those people with bad kids or grandkids who likes to blame everything on the school system."

BratBgone, what your school system did was excellent. But I know parents who were told the very thing that you're disputing, and it has come up on anti-Ritalin websites. Some teachers even threatened to call CPS if the parents did not have their child put on Ritalin or Adderall. It was apparently happening often enough that my state (eastern US) passed a law a few years ago specifically prohibiting teachers and school administrators from trying to force parents to put their children on hyperactivity medication. Coincidentally, the state began mandating that elementary schools reinstate recess (many had cut it out using federal testing as the excuse)—and lo and behold, problems with restless, inattentive children dramatically declined. But what are other states doing?

And you are absolutely correct that for a teacher to tell a parent to place their child on any prescription medication constitutes practicing medicine without proper credentials. But it has been happening in some areas.

I do not know about other states, but California cracked down on teachers diagnosing students with mental disorders. Teachers were telling breeders that their brats had autism of different types, ADHD and other diagnoses when they were not qualified. There were a couple of incidents where teachers were hauled up in front of the state licensing authorities for health professionals and fined heavily. I am not sure, but I do think a few teachers lost their certifications over the fiasco.

As long as you have a system that is geared towards the bulk diagnosis of brats with different mental disorders just to get additional money, teachers, breeders and their co-conspirators in the school district administrations will continue to push for these brats to be medicated. Maybe most of them need a good spanking and discipline more than a Ritalin prescription, but you know breeders are too fucking lazy.

k-man said:

"BratBgone, what your school system did was excellent. But I know parents who were told the very thing that you're disputing, and it has come up on anti-Ritalin websites. Some teachers even threatened to call CPS if the parents did not have their child put on Ritalin or Adderall. It was apparently happening often enough that my state (eastern US) passed a law a few years ago specifically prohibiting teachers and school administrators from trying to force parents to put their children on hyperactivity medication. Coincidentally, the state began mandating that elementary schools reinstate recess (many had cut it out using federal testing as the excuse)—and lo and behold, problems with restless, inattentive children dramatically declined. But what are other states doing?

And you are absolutely correct that for a teacher to tell a parent to place their child on any prescription medication constitutes practicing medicine without proper credentials. But it has been happening in some areas."

I think that 85% of kids on ADHD drugs shouldn't be on them. They need structure at home and school, discipline, and a way to burn off their excess energy. Our school was one of the rare ones that actually had the kids in Phys. Ed. 3 times a week for 30 mins., and a 45 minute recess period each day. Kids need physical activity, it sharpens their alertness. Nothing worked better than a 2-3 min. period of exercise when I saw my students becoming inattentive to a subject.

Some of the children on meds REALLY needed to be. They had true, severe ADHD and couldn't control their actions. Many times other children would be injured by their behavior. Often these kids came from rough, disorganized families who were bad about making sure they filled their child's prescription. These kids would have documentation from their doctor for them to take their meds at school. If the parunt was neglectful about refilling scripts, and the child continually ran out of meds at school, we would contact the school social worker to pay a visit to the parunts. In nearly all cases these children were on medicaid and their meds were free. The parunts just needed to be prompted by the school to pick up their free meds because they were lazy.