NIMH - USING STIMULANTS FOR ADHD INCREASES HEART RATE LONG-TERM - American Journal of Psychiatry

National Institute of  Mental Health

National Institute of Mental Health, Transforming the understanding and treatment of mental illness throught research.

   
   
    Science Update • September 07, 2011
Continued Use of Stimulants for ADHD Likely Does Not Increase Risk for Hypertension, but May Affect Heart Rate


Chronic use of stimulant medication to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children does not appear to increase risk for high blood pressure over the long term, but it may have modest effects on heart rate, according to follow-up data from the NIMH-funded Multimodal Treatment Study of Children with ADHD (MTA). The study was published online ahead of print Sept 2, 2011, in the American Journal of Psychiatry.
Background

The MTA was the first major multi-site trial comparing different treatments for ADHD in childhood. The initial results of the 14-month study, in which 579 children were randomly assigned to one of three intensive treatment groups (medication management alone, behavioral treatment alone, a combination of both) or to routine community care, were published in 1999. The researchers found that medication management alone or in combination with behavioral therapy produced better symptomatic relief for children with ADHD than just behavioral therapy or usual community care.

After the study ended, participants returned to community treatment and were free to pursue whatever treatment course they wished. MTA researchers gathered follow-up data from MTA study participants at 2, 3, 6, 8, and 10 years after study entry.

ADHD is often a chronic condition that continues into adolescence, so some children take stimulants for years. Because stimulants can affect the heart, doctors are concerned about the possible risks for rapid heart rate, hypertension (high blood pressure) or other cardiovascular effects after many years of use. But studies have been inconsistent about whether the effects are long-lasting.

For this most recent data analysis, Benedetto Vitiello, M.D., of NIMH, and MTA colleagues examined the MTA follow-up data to determine if there was an association between chronic use of stimulant medication and changes in blood pressure or heart rate over a 10-year period.
Results of the Study

At the end of the 14-month study, children who were randomized to stimulant treatment in the study had, on average, higher heart rates compared to the children who were randomized to non-medication or community care. Heart rates for the children who continued to take stimulants after the end of the study were slightly elevated at subsequent checks, but they did not have an abnormally elevated heart rate (e.g., tachycardia).

The researchers concluded that stimulant medication did not appear to increase the risk for abnormal elevations in blood pressure or heart rate over a 10-year period. However, because some epidemiological studies have indicated that even modest elevations in heart rate may increase a person’s lifetime risk for cardiovascular problems, the persistent effect of continuous stimulant treatment on heart rate should not be dismissed.
Significance

The results of this study indicate that the effect of stimulants on heart rate can be detected even after years of use, suggesting that the body does not get completely used to it. However, after 10 years of treatment, researchers found no increased risk for hypertension. In addition, none of the children reported any adverse cardiovascular events over the 10-year period.

The researchers do note that the effect on heart rate may be clinically significant for individuals who have underlying heart conditions. Therefore, children taking stimulants over the long-term should be monitored regularly for potential cardiovascular complications.
Citation

Vitiello B, Elliott GR, Swanson JM, Arnold E, Hechtman L, Abikoff H, Molina BSG, Wells K, Wigal T, Jensen PS, Greenhill LL, Kaltman JR, Severe JB, Odbert C, Hur K, Gibbons R. Blood pressure and heart rate in the multimodal treatment of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder study over 10 years. American Journal of Psychiatry. Online ahead of print Sept 2, 2011.

WASHINGTON POST CONVERSATIONS - ABOUT ADHD (August 2011 + Lara Akinbami

August 18, 2011
 
Lara Akinbami, is a board-certified pediatrician and conducts epidemiologic research on child health and chronic conditions, and focuses on childhood asthma.

About the topic
Nearly one in 10 U.S. children is being diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), according to a new analysis of federal data released Thursday. Dr. Lara Akinbami, one of the researches who worked on the analysis, will answer reader questions about the study and what they found, including how ADHD affects children by age, race, gender, location and more.

Ask your question now!
Lara Akinbami :

Good afternoon--I'm happy to answer questions about the data from CDC on Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in kids.

    –

Q.
ADHD
My husband has ADHD. My son is 4 and has some symptoms of ADHD. Is he pre-destined for it?

    –
    August 18, 2011 1:42 PM
    Permalink

A.
Lara Akinbami :

ADHD certainly does run in families, but that doesn't necessarily mean your son is predestined to have ADHD.  We don't fully understand what causes ADHD or know how to prevent it.  The signs and symptoms usually appear before age 7 and can be related to either inattention (distracted easily, being forgetful), or the hyperactivity and impulsivity (being "driven by a motor" or not waiting your turn to talk or play). An official diagnosis often isn't made until children are in school because more symptoms may become apparent when children are required to perform tasks in which they may not necessarily be interested or find fun.  I would  ask your son's doctor more about the diagnosis process, but don't be surprised if they advise you to wait and see how he grows and develops.  Try not to worry and just enjoy his childhood!
– August 18, 2011 2:04 PM
Q.
Research

How did you conduct the research? What steps were taken to come to these conclusions?

    –
    August 18, 2011 2:00 PM
    Permalink

A.
Lara Akinbami :

The data that show that ADHD has been increasing over the past decade come from the National Health Interview Survey that is administered by the National Center for Health Statistics (part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention).  Each year, about 40,000 households undergo face-to-face interviews with detailed health questions.  Depending on the year, about 8,000 to 12,000 children ages 0-17 are included to represent the total population of children in the United States. The ADHD data are based on a parent reporting for these sampled children that they had received a diagnosis of ADHD from a doctor or other health professional at some point in the past.  We then assess trends in the percent of children diagnosed with ADHD by race and ethnicity, by income, and by geographic region.
– August 18, 2011 2:07 PM
Q.
Nutrition?
Would you say that nutrition ( or lack thereof) is a major contributor to ADHD in children from low-income areas?

    –
    August 18, 2011 1:46 PM
    Permalink

A.
Lara Akinbami :

I wish we had the information to answer that great question.  There are many factors that likely come into play.   But at present, we do not know which factors determine who gets ADHD, how to predict who will get ADHD, or to prevent it from occuring.  There is effective treatment once a child is diagnosed.

The increased prevalence of ADHD in low income children over the past decade is very interesting.   We think it has to do primarily with better opportunities among this population to get diagnosed through increased access to healthcare and increased recognition of the condition by parents, teachers, and doctors.
– August 18, 2011 2:10 PM
Q.
What do we know about diagnosis and race?
I wonder what we know about rates of diagnosis in racial groups and, not unrelated, what we know about diagnosis and family income?

    –
    August 18, 2011 2:07 PM
    Permalink

A.
Lara Akinbami :

The patterns of ADHD prevalence by race and family income over the past decade are interesting.  At the beginning of the decade, non-Hispanic white children had higher ADHD prevalence than other race groups.  By the end of the decade, non-Hispanic black children and Puerto Rican children had caught up to non-Hispanic white children so that they all had about 10% prevalence of ADHD.  Mexican children, however, had lower ADHD prevalence throughout the decade and had about 4% ADHD prevalence at the end of the decade.  We don't have the data from the National Health Interview Survey to understand exactly why these difference exist or why the patterns have changed over the past decade, but as said above, it may have to do a lot with the opportunities of different groups to obtain a diagnosis.  The diagnosis actually takes many steps and requires continued evaluation.  Ideally, a family will have a sustained relationship with the health care provider guiding through the process.

For income, the pattern also changed through the decade where all income groups had similar prevalence at the beginning of the decade, but prevalence rose steadily for low income children.  At the end of the decade, children with family income below 200% of the federal poverty level had higher prevalence of ADHD compared with children with family income above 200% of the poverty level.  Again, this may be due to changing access to healthcare, or better recognition of the condition among low income children.
– August 18, 2011 2:20 PM
Q.
ADHD Girls
My daughter was diagnosed iwth ADHD in the second grade (after spending most of the first grade in the hall). After trying a modified diet and behavioural therapy we finally agreed to drug therapy which has been moderately successful. What is the prevalence of ADHD in girls and what are the long-term outcomes for girls as a group diagnosed with ADHD.

    –
    August 18, 2011 2:28 PM
    Permalink

A.
Lara Akinbami :

Oh, sorry about all the hallway time!  The prevalence in girls (5.5%)  is lower than in boys (12.3%), and this has been consistent over time--prevalence in boys and girls has grown over the past decade at about the same rate.

Girls are more likely to have the inattentive symptoms rather than the hyperactive symptoms, but it varies from individual to individual.  And while the prognosis for children with ADHD is lower academic achievement and socialization problems, this varies from person to person.  The noteworthy risk is higher incidence of automobile accidents as teenagers.   It is great that you have already started with behavioral therapy.  Coping skills in staying organized and establishing a routine are wonderful tools to help your daughter successfully navigate her way.  And your  staying engaged in her childhood to help her make good choices will also be key.  And don't be shy about helping her become a safe driver:)
– August 18, 2011 2:45 PM
Q.
Birth Control Connection?
Probably 100% of our woman took birth control pills one time or another. Has there ever been a connection let alone a long term study to connect the pill to our children's chronic ailments?

    –
    August 18, 2011 2:44 PM
    Permalink

A.
Lara Akinbami :

 I am not aware of any theories or studies linking contraception to ADHD or other chronic conditions.
– August 18, 2011 2:54 PM
Q.
US percentages compared with European percentages
I am curious what the percentage of European children diagnosed with ADD and ADHD is. Do you have this data? I have brought 2 children up in New York with one being diagnosed when he was about 6. He is now 16 and living in Europe and doctors there say he is a perfectly normal child. Is there a case of over diagnosis in the US?

    –
    August 18, 2011 2:55 PM
    Permalink

A.
Lara Akinbami :

I don't have a recent estimate of ADHD in European countries, but there have been studies in the past that suggest that on a population level, the prevalence of ADHD in other countries is similar to that in the US.

I can't really comment on the 16 year old living in Europe, except to suggest that perhaps he has learned to cope with the symptoms and could look a lot different than when he was 6 years old.  Also, in some people, the symptoms do seem to abate with age.  Or perhaps he is eating some wonderful Belgium chocolate.  That cures all ills...

OK, enough of chocolate reverie--I don't have the data to be able to comment on whether ADHD is over-diagnosed in the US.  But I will say that the established diagnostic criteria is specific, it requires the symptoms to be present at a young age, that the symptoms be persistent for at least 6 months, and that the symptoms be present in multiple settings.  It shouldn't be a diagnosis made at one point in time, but after some in-depth assessment.

In sum, you may have a good idea for some additional research.
– August 18, 2011 3:07 PM
Q.
Diagnostic process changing?
What I find fascinating about the increase in diagnosis in low-income children,

BBC PANORAMA 2009 - ON DRUGS FOR ADHD

Questions over drugs for ADHD-PANORAMA BBC

Treating children who have Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) with drugs has no advantage over other treatments in the long term, research has shown.

A study obtained by the BBC's Panorama programme says drugs such as Ritalin and Concerta work no better than therapy after three years of treatment.

The findings by an influential US study also suggested long-term use of the drugs could stunt children's growth.

The Multimodal Treatment Study of Children with ADHD has been monitoring the treatment of 600 children across the US since the 1990s.

In 1999, the American study concluded that after 14 months, medication worked better than behavioural therapy for ADHD.
  
The Department of Health has issued a statement on the treatment of ADHD

The study now concludes that this advantage is lost after 36 months.

Most of the estimated 500,000 children in Britain with ADHD receive no treatment at all.

But of those that do, most - about 55,000 last year - are prescribed stimulants like Ritalin and Concerta.

The cost of these drugs to the NHS is about £28m.

The National Institute for Clinical Excellence is currently revising the treatment guidelines for ADHD.



Correction February 19 2010: Following a ruling by the BBC Trust, this report has been amended and some material removed. Details of the Trust's finding can be found here.

ADHD as a Social Construct - An Example of Psychiatric Diagnosis

Am J Psychiatry 164:1612, October 2007






 2007 American Journal of Psychiatry

Letter to the Editor


Psychiatric Disorders as Social Constructs: ADHD as a Case in Point


OLAVO B. AMARAL, M.D.


Porto Alegre, Brazil


To The Editor: The article by Guilherme Polanczyk, M.D., et al. (1), in the June 2007 issue of the Journal, provides important insights pertaining to the worldwide prevalence of childhood attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Dr. Polanczyk et al. convincingly argued that symptoms of ADHD may have a more constant geographic prevalence than previously thought. However, the accompanying editorial may have overestimated the implications of these findings (2).


The statement that a constant prevalence of ADHD symptoms argues in favor of "ADHD’s identity as a bona fide mental disorder, as opposed to a social construction" (2, p. 856) may be misinterpreting the nature of psychiatric nosology. The concept of a disorder and its diagnostic criteria are social constructions by definition, and the fact that a group of symptoms has a constant geographic prevalence has little to do with what leads these symptoms to be considered a diagnostic entity. Twin pregnancies, for example, are observed worldwide with limited prevalence variation; however, being a twin in some indigenous cultures in Africa and South America could lead a child to be left to die or to be attributed with supernatural powers, whereas the same biological occurrence has far less relevance in modern Western society. Thus, universal phenomena can be viewed as normal or dysfunctional according to cultural beliefs.


Perhaps the best way to judge whether ADHD is a social construction, therefore, is not to look at the worldwide prevalence of its symptoms, but rather to evaluate the prevalence of its recognition and treatment. In this area, differences are striking. The per capita consumption of methylphenidate in the United States between 2003 and 2005 was approximately six times greater than that of Australia, eight times greater than that of Spain, and 18 times greater than that of Chile (3). If the prevalence of hyperactive symptoms is indeed similar among these countries, this probably means that a "hyperactivity disorder" deserving treatment in one country is seen by parents and physicians as a nonmedical condition (perhaps at the higher end of the "childhood activity spectrum") elsewhere.


It is in defining such a diagnostic threshold that lies the social construction, as the boundaries of normality in a given region are set by psychiatrists (by choosing and applying diagnostic criteria) and society (by recognizing symptoms as deserving of medical care). Thus, it is probably not useful to ask whether DSM-IV has too low a threshold for ADHD or whether ICD-10 has too high a threshold, since there is little evidence of a biological threshold to be identified; the definition of such a threshold is the collective social duty of physicians, parents, and society. It is crucial that we acknowledge not only the existence of this construction, but also the responsibilities inherent in taking part in it. Symptoms might be constant throughout the world, but it is how we view them that will give them meaning and define the care of children worldwide.


Footnotes


The author reports no competing interests.


This letter (doi: 10.1176/appi.ajp.2007.07060942) was accepted for publication in July 2007.


References


1. Polanczyk G, de Lima MS, Horta BL, Biederman J, Rohde LA: The worldwide prevalence of ADHD: a systematic review and metaregression analysis. Am J Psychiatry 2007; 164:942–948[Abstract/Free Full Text]


2. Moffitt TE, Melchior M: Why does the worldwide prevalence of childhood attention deficit hyperactivity disorder matter? Am J Psychiatry 2007; 164:856–858[Free Full Text]


3. International Narcotics Control Board: Psychotropic Drugs: Statistics for 2005: Assessment of Annual Medical and Scientific Requirement. New York, United Nations, 2006, pp.269

FDA WARNINGS ON ADHD DRUGS

New Warnings on ADHD Drugs


  By Susan Heavey Mon Aug 21, 8:26 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Several drugs to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder must include new warning information about the risk of heart problems and psychotic behavior, U.S. health officials said on Monday.
The drugs, which include GlaxoSmithKline Plc's Dexedrine and Novartis AG's Ritalin, must include a warning about the possible risk of sudden death and serious heart problems, Food and Drug Administration spokeswoman Susan Bro told Reuters.

The drugs, stimulants that can raise blood pressure, must also include warnings about the risk of behavioral problems such as aggression and mania, she said.

Bro could not confirm whether other ADHD drugs -- Johnson & Johnson's Concerta and Eli Lilly and Co.'s Strattera -- also were ordered to carry the warnings.

Strattera already includes a caution about suicidal thoughts, while Shire Plc's Adderall already carries a warning that misuse can cause heart problems.

The FDA's decision comes months after two separate panels of outside experts offered conflicting opinions on whether the risks warranted the strongest warnings possible -- a so-called black box.

FDA's Bro could not confirm whether the heart warning was boxed. But a letter from Glaxo made public earlier on Monday advising doctors about the new warnings said the heart caution was a boxed warning.

Other non-boxed warnings about psychotic behavior, stunted growth, seizures and vision problems also were included, Glaxo's letter said.

Holly Russell, spokeswoman for the British drugmaker, said Glaxo agreed with the FDA's request to add the warning language and complied with the agency's recommended wording.

Other drugmakers did not immediately return calls seeking comment.

In March, FDA advisers said new information about the risks should be added to the labels for attention deficit drugs. The outside experts stopped short of supporting a boxed warning, saying they did not want to scare off patients or their parents.

A different FDA panel in February recommended black box heart-related warnings but said it was unclear if the drugs caused heart-related complications.

Some doctors have expressed concern that new warnings could dampen use of the medicines, which the FDA has estimated see about 1 million prescriptions for adults and 2 million for children each month.

Critics say many of the prescriptions are unnecessary and that the drugs are over used.

FDA's Bro said the agency began contacting Glaxo and Novartis about the new warning requirements in May.

That same month, Canadian health authorities publicly warned people with high blood pressure, heart disease and other medical problems to avoid taking medications for ADHD.

22 Aug, 2006

INTERVIEW WITH FRED BAUGHMAN - COURTESY OF NATURAL NEWS - "THE ADHD FRAUD."

Neurologist Dr. Fred Baughman talks about the fraud of ADHD and the poisoning of U.S. children

Wednesday, August 30, 2006
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
Editor of NaturalNews.com    
  



SHARE THIS ARTICLE
  
Mike: Hello everyone, this is Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, and I'm talking about the mythical disease known as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and the overmedication of the population, with Dr. Fred Baughman. I want to give you a little background about why I'm so interested in interviewing you. Our readers will really appreciate your information, because we cover this subject quite extensively. We have similar views on it and there is a lot of increasing interest out there.

Dr. Fred Baughman: In the area of child psychiatric drugs, the main focus has been the recently commenced FDA hearings, which pertain to reports of death, strokes and heart attacks in children and adults. The first report concerning Adderall came out about a year ago. Adderall is the number one ADHD drug, and that report dealt with 12 or so individuals that were said to have had strokes, if you can imagine a stroke occurring in a young child. Some were sudden deaths and others were heart complications, and a total of 20 to 30 such reports lead Health Canada to take Adderall off the market.

Mike: Now these records are through the voluntary MedWatch system, correct?

Dr. Baughman: Exactly, which the FDA explains in a booklet about the mechanics of MedWatch and other similar voluntary reporting schemes. They confessed that such schemes ordinarily identify no more than one percent of actual occurrences. So at any rate, there we had that occurrence about a year ago with Health Canada taking Adderall off the market and our FDA not taking Adderall off the market. Subsequently, we learned our FDA lobbied Health Canada behind-the-scenes not to take it off the market.

Mike: That is unbelievable. The FDA applied pressure to foreign nations to protect dangerous drugs in our own market.

Dr. Baughman: Yes, it's just that. Then about three or four months ago, Health Canada put Adderall back on the market. It wasn't because they had any good evidence of its safety or effectiveness. Adderall is a mixture of the two salts of amphetamine, so it's a pure amphetamine. The fascinating thing about Adderall is that it was a weight reduction drug for adults called Obetrol. It's was so extremely addictive that Obetrol was taken off the market for that reason. Now we have the FDA bringing this extraordinarily addictive drug to market for little children.

Mike: So it was too dangerous for adults but not unsafe for children.

Dr. Baughman: In fact, they are bringing it to market for entirely normal little children said to have the illusory, bogus disease called ADHD.

Mike: For those reading, you're a pediatric neurologist correct?

Dr. Baughman: Yes, and I practiced both adult and child neurology, board-certified in both. I have been a long-standing fellow of the American Academy of Neurology.

Mike: Okay, so you come from the world of what I might call conventional medicine. You are an M.D., and yet, over the years, and I'm sure you'll explain how this happened, you found some mass distortions happening with ADHD so you launched a web site called ADHDfraud.org. My first question: At what point as a pediatric neurologist did you begin to see something was wrong with this picture?

Baughman: I began to publish actual research works when I was in training, first at Sinai Hospital in New York and after that, at the Boston Veteran Hospital. After the first 10 years of my practice, which was in Grand Rapids Michigan, I published a considerable body of original research mainly having to do with genetically determined brain decisions or neurological diseases and chromosome abnormalities. Much of that work was published with Dr. Joseph Mann, also of Grand Rapids. I have discovered and described actual diseases, and that's the background that I bring to my newfound duty of evaluating and critiquing modern-day psychiatry, especially where it pertains to their wholly fraudulent claims that their diagnoses, such as ADHD, bipolar OCD and depression are actual brain diseases when they are not.

At any rate, that's the rest of my background and qualifications. Now I was in private practice from 1964 to 1993 when I retired, and it was during the 70s that I began to notice, first in Grand Rapids and then here in San Diego where I relocated, the increasing frequency of the burst of diagnoses of hyperactivity and brain damage. Then in 1980, the American Psychiatric Association invented ADD, or attention deficit disorder, and with that the epidemic seemed to worsen. It appeared to me that the frequency of such diagnoses and their treatment with Ritalin, an amphetamine-like drug every bit as addictive as cocaine, were increasing in my community. At first I took note and later became alarmed at the frequency with which children were being referred to me by schools through their physician with these diagnostic labels put in place, basically by schoolteachers.

Mike: This was a "disease" that almost appeared to be spreading like a virus.

Dr. Baughman: It was a notion of a disease, an illusory disease; with child psychiatry repeating the lie often enough that it was becoming a reality, especially for the educational establishment and teachers nationwide, and increasingly, the media or the public at large. Then in 1997 with the epidemic standing somewhere around 500 to 700,000 nationwide, they simply rewrote the diagnostic criteria by adding hyperactivity to the attention deficit.

Mike: Do you mean to say that there is a group of psychiatrists who meet in a room somewhere and they just write down and invent whatever behavioral observations they want to assign to this disease definition?

Dr. Baughman: That is exactly the way it works. In medicine, including my specialty, neurology, if a curious observant physician discovers a new abnormality in a patient in his practice or in his clinic at medical schools, that previously unobserved abnormality is the new disease. So there has to be an objective abnormality. In diabetes, there is elevated blood sugar in the blood throughout all the tissues. With cancer, a pathologist has to see cells that have abnormal nuclei and chromosomes under the microscope in order to contend that that patient has that disease or a disease. But in psychiatry, the committee of the diagnostic and statistical manual meets in a room and by a show of hands, they consider one another's favorite galaxies or mixture of behaviors and vote those into existence and give it a code number or an entry into the DSM, and they are all psychiatric disorders. By the word "disorder," they mean disease.

Mike: Can you give us an example of the type of behaviors that are listed in the DSM as being diseases or disorders?

Dr. Baughman: In the case of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, here are the 14 symptoms that appeared in the 1987 DSM. Remember, a child found to have eight of them was deemed to have ADHD. Number one is often fidgets or squirms; two is trouble staying in one's seat; three is easily distracted; four is can't wait one's turn; five is blurts out answers; six is trouble following instructions; seven is can't sustain attention; eight is shifts from one activity to another; nine doesn't play quietly; 10 talks excessively; 11 interrupts; 12 can't listen; 13 loses things; 14 does dangerous things, thrill seeking and so on.

Mike: Wow, I think you just described probably half the population.

Dr. Baughman: Right, exactly, so much for their motivation. It's just absolutely brilliant, the marketing scheme, as long as you get away with it.

Mike: And they are getting away with it.

Dr. Baughman: The Center for Disease Control estimated in 2004 that there were 4 million cases nationwide in children 17 and under.

Mike: Now isn't it one out of every 10 children in public schools?

Dr. Baughman: As of 2003 I believe it was. Professor William Cary of the University of Pennsylvania testified to Congress that 17 percent of all school children as of 2003 are on some type of psychiatric drug, not all ADHD drugs and not all with an ADHD diagnosis. I think that the number today is probably one in five, or 20 percent. It was 17 percent according to Dr. Cary in 2003. It's probably 20 percent today.

Mike: It's astounding. Even if this disease were legitimate, this was something that doesn't exist in other countries and it didn't exist anywhere two generations ago. How do the psychiatrics explain the abrupt emergence of this apparent disease?

Dr. Baughman: They don't much explain it. People who try to ask legitimate questions of them are generally ignored because they don't have any scientific answers. They know it is a big lie, and as long as they are getting away with it and as long as they have full access to the US Department of Education and the lobbyists to members of Congress, they enact the diagnosis and treatment of this into law. Consequently, there are laws on the books that mandate a certain level of diagnosis in the schools and that even pay extra to school districts for every child that is diagnosed with one of their bogus and contrived diseases and treated as special-education subjects. Taxpayers end up paying two or three times as much for children thus labeled as they do for normal kids.

Mike: Let me clarify that. So a school district that gets more of its children are diagnosed with ADHD, it gets rewarded with more funds?

Dr. Baughman: They get more funds. There are even laws on the books that pay parents a stipend for every child they have who is diagnosed and thus considered disabled. So I think they get Social Security disability. I think the stipend, at least a few years ago, was $400 a month.

Mike: Isn't this a situation where everybody is on the take, so they can turn the bodies of our children into profit machines?

Dr. Baughman: That's exactly what is happening. These entirely bogus junk science pseudoscientific labels are a barcode on the forehead of a child, and once the label gets in their record, it sticks. They can't get rid of it. If a child or an adult gets one of these labels, this stigmatizes that individual. They are going to have more trouble getting health care insurance and trouble finding employment. The armed services will not take children who have been on these drugs. I must confess that as the Armed Forces have failed to meet their quota for the Iraq war, they have dropped their standards and they are recently accepting persons who have such labels and have been on such drugs.

Mike: Well, let's get back to the parents if we could for a minute. People in positions of authority, people who apparently have an education in neurology or psychiatry, are telling parents that their children have a chemical brain disorder. It's a very convincing argument to the parents.

Dr. Baughman: Yes it is, and I must point out that virtually every physician-patient encounter in the country, regardless of specialty, has wholeheartedly embraced this scheme. That includes the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Child Neurology Society, of which I am a member, the American Academy of Family Practice and by various psychological groups. The American Academy of Pediatrics in fact, republished in the DSM for diagnostic criteria for ADHD in the Journal Pediatrics, I think it was in 1999, and subsequently published a guideline for the psychostimulant treatment of ADHD the following year, I believe in 2000. In so doing, the American Academy of Pediatrics along with the other groups I just mentioned, served notice that they intended to enter the business of diagnosing and drugging entirely normal children for profit. That's one of the things that have spurred the epidemic.

Mike: Now, do you have any colleagues who are also standing up and openly questioning this practice, or are you pretty much finding yourself isolated?

Dr. Baughman: I've been isolated, but there are a small cadre of honest scientific physicians who feel as I do, and a smaller number yet, that are speaking out. I've really been surprised to behold the impact that my web site has had. Now I've got a book that is going to be published soon.

Mike: Can you give us the title of that book please?

Dr. Baughman: Yes, it's called "The ADHD Fraud, How Psychiatry Makes Patients of Normal Children." It will be available through www.trafford.com. Trafford Publishing Company, and it should be available within the week.

Mike: Have you been pressured to censor your views in any way or have you taken any heat?

Dr. Baughman: Back in 1994-95, I made a formal written proposal to the American Academy of Neurology to write practice parameter for ADHD that would essentially determine the best advisable practices for the disease. The Academy wrote an encouraging response and gave me the go ahead in writing. I presented them with a statement saying that my review of the world scientific literature found no evidence that ADHD was a disease. The next thing that happened was that I heard from members of the Quality Assurance Committee that my efforts wouldn't really be needed any longer. So I was essentially deep-sixed; I was put on the shelf.

Mike: Do you know which of these groups accept money from pharmaceutical companies?

Dr. Baughman: Every one of them. Every one of them accepts lots of money and there is no such thing as a psychiatric expert in any psychiatric disorder that is not wholly owned or operated by the pharmaceutical industry.

Mike: That's a big statement.

Dr. Baughman: That is a big statement and a big and tragic truth.

Mike: So these experts are really just paid promoters of the drugs.

Dr. Baughman: They've got M.D. degrees and so they masquerade as scientific physicians but they have sold their souls and they have sold whatever scientific credentials they ever had.

Mike: What kind of money can they make writing these prescriptions for children?

Dr. Baughman: They are making an immense amount of money, millions of dollars.

Mike: This is all very difficult for the average American parent or consumer to swallow. They simply cannot believe that individuals would be so evil as to sell their souls to pharmaceutical companies.

Dr. Baughman: I think this has a great deal to do with the magnitude of the psychiatric epidemic in general and the ADHD epidemic. Parents, ordinary layman, going with their children at the behest of school officials in the first place, could not believe that someone would tell a total lie to them. They cannot imagine that. At the moment, I'm working with individuals to put together a consumer fraud suit here in the state of California, based on fraudulent diagnosis of ADHD and subsequent drugging. If you've been lied to and told you have a disease when you don't and then drugged, that's battery.

Mike: Is there a web site that people can go to?

Dr. Baughman: For this consumer fraud action, we only need a handful of four or five plaintiffs. It's not like a class action where you need hundreds.

Mike: Will you keep me posted on this action?

Dr. Baughman: Yes, people keep asking about it. I tell them to keep an eye on my web site because if we get this thing going, I certainly will be posting notes as to our progress or lack of it.

Mike: If you set a precedent in California, this thing could really sweep the nation.

Dr. Baughman: That is what we hope. They've had such obscene amounts of drug company money to defend themselves, that no one has really succeeded against them as is necessary to put an end to this fraud. It's so much more than a fraud when they actually poison normal children, which is what they're doing.

Mike: I've heard it described somewhere else on the internet as a chemical holocaust or crimes against humanity.

Dr. Baughman: There has been a perversion of the language. They have taken entirely normal children and made patients out of them by diagnosing them with fictional chemical imbalances of the brain. It's a total fraud. I have observed two national news programs recently, talking about a new kind of disability that our soldiers in the Iraqi conflict are developing. I listened to hear what the new disease was. Lo and behold, it was PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder. I grant you, there are a lot of troubling visions and experiences that all men in a war are exposed to, and these cause troubling flashbacks and troubled sleep. But it's not an organic disease of the brain as psychiatry would have us believe, nor are these symptoms inevitable. They would have all the soldiers over there believe that PTSD is a disease with a grave prognosis. They tell them they are never going to get rid of these terrible flashbacks without the help of a new drug that they're trying to develop to obliterate those painful memories.

Mike: Well, that's the way to make a permanent customer, isn't it?

Dr. Baughman: Yes, and the media has bought into this psychiatric disease mongering, and that's why it is rampant. That's why the drugging of our children is rampant.

Mike: Isn't the next great marketing frontier for these companies adult ADHD now?

Dr. Baughman: Well yes, it's not the future; it's the present. There has been a tremendous year-to-year growth in the billions of prescriptions for Adderall, Ritalin, Concerta, and all the other amphetamines. My alma mater, New York University School of Medicine, is at the very forefront of this fraud. There was a story in the magazine section of the New York Times roughly a year ago, describing the launch of an adult ADHD clinic at the University. They had a hall or a big space at the Helmsley Hotel. I guess they had signs out on the curb saying this was underway on the top floor. If you want to be checked for ADHD, go on up.

Mike: They had a recruiting service there.

Dr. Baughman: People went up and they took this behavioral checklist test and 85 percent of those taking the test had the disease! They got labeled and were on their way the very next day to their doctors with a new label.

Mike: Is it true that I could make an appointment with a psychiatrist walk in and say I have trouble focusing, I'm easily distracted and I fidget a lot, and right then I could be diagnosed and put on these drugs?

Dr. Baughman: Let me tell you something. In a 2002 survey done by the American Academy Of Child and Adult Psychiatry, they looked at the surveying practices of child psychiatrists and found that 91 percent of children seeing child psychiatrists came out of their initial visit with a prescription for a drug.

Mike: Ninety-one percent?

Dr. Baughman: Ninety-one percent. I would say that a third to a half of all the patients I saw as a neurologist had no organic disease. Now contrast that with this 2002 study survey of child psychiatry, where 91 percent are coming away with a prescription. Were the 90 percent commonsense parents? Most likely.

Mike: If you look at the big picture of what's happening here, what does this say about scientific integrity in Western civilization, if these well-educated people in this so-called scientific organization can invent such a widespread hoax? Does this have you questioning some of scientific truth today, or what's your view on it?

Dr. Baughman: I pointed out earlier that it's not just psychiatry, but its pediatrics, neurologists, family practitioners, psychologists, school teachers across the country have become pawns and have not seeing the evil of their ways by becoming pushers for the drugging establishment. This is the standard of practice across the board. The entire profession has been bought out. On average, every physician in the country gets $13,000 per year from the drug companies.

Mike: In what form?

Dr. Baughman: They get free dinners, golf, free trips, but that money isn't spread around equally. It is spread strategically so that your top policy makers in medicine -- your top psychiatrists and your heads of departments -- get more money than anyone else. Some get about $500,000 a year, and it has been so successful that no one within academic medicine can speak out as I speak out. I knew a long time ago I would not prove compatible with the sort of control from above that is the rule in academic medicine.

Mike: So you are saying that anybody in academic medicine has to go along to get along.

Dr. Baughman: If they were to stand up and say things that I say, they would be out the next day. NYU has become a hive for disease-inventing psychiatry. I got the sad news that the department received more funds to train more poisoners of normal children.

Mike: Well, I think it's obvious that you have experienced the idea that when you operate with integrity in this world, it can be a pretty lonely path. Now let's talk about poisoning and the long-term implications. What happens to Americans when one out of five children grow up on speed or some other kind of psychiatric drug?

Dr. Baughman: Well, we are at that number clearly. We are drugging well over 10 million. There is no sign that it's getting better. I pointed out that ADHD in adults is a rapidly growing market sector, so I think when you are told you've got a disease and you are in fact normal, you are damaged just by the label. When you are given a drug to normalize an abnormality in your body or brain that doesn't exist, that's poisoning and you are going to be damaged by that drug every single time. So the side effect rate for Ritalin or for Adderall is 100 percent. There is no kid that gets put on these drugs that isn't altered by them. Their perceptions, behaviors, feelings and emotions are always changed and not always noticeably. They are always altered and there are horrible long-term consequences that we can't begin to know.

Mike: What long-term side effects have you heard of?

Dr. Baughman: I mentioned before that Health Canada found that there were roughly 20 to 30 cases of strokes in young children, roughly 10 or 12 sudden deaths, heart abnormalities. Just before the Feb. 9 FDA hearing, there were 51 reported cases of complications, deaths, strokes and heart attacks reported to the FDA MedWatch program. I have written testimony on the record for the Feb. 9 FDA conference. In fact, back in the 1990s, I testified in a Kansas City case for Mr. Gary Bell on behalf of his daughter Stephanie. She underwent heart surgery for what I think was a complication of her long-term Ritalin use. At any rate, Gary Bell and I did a freedom of information request for all the deaths and injuries related to Ritalin or methylphenidate, and for 1990-1997 there were 160 deaths from methylphenidate Ritalin. There were another 26 deaths for 1998 to 2000, 186 deaths for the decade.

Mike: Again, these are only voluntary reports.

Dr. Baughman: These are voluntary reporting schemes to MedWatch, 1 percent of actual incidents the FDA says. That means there may have been 18,600 for that decade. I have personally been consulted in about a dozen death cases, including Matthew Smith of Royal Oak, Michigan, which is just outside of Detroit. He and his parents had been coerced to stay on Ritalin from first grade to age 13. He suddenly fell over while playing with friends and died. At autopsy, his heart muscle was diffusely enlarged, scarred and infiltrated with fat. The medical examiner, Dr. Drakovic, a highly experienced pathologist, said there was no doubt in his mind that Matthew Smith died of long-term chronic amphetamine methylphenidate Ritalin poisoning.

Mike: So we have a population that is potentially setting themselves up for long-term death and harm just like drug addicts?

Dr. Baughman: Yes. Reports that young athletes, college and high school athletes suddenly drop dead are not uncommon. There was a pro ballplayer, I think a pitcher on the Baltimore Orioles, who had been on supplements that contained ephedrine, which is very similar to the amphetamines. My feeling is that steroid use and amphetamine use is very, very common in athletes at the high school level and up. I think every one of those deaths is conceivably related to psychiatric drugs, most of which have startling coronary cardiac heart consequences. Not just amphetamines, but all of these so-called antipsychotics, which are horrible poisons the pharmaceutical industry is hoisting upon the population. Almost all those drugs have cardiac side effects as well.

Mike: Before I wrap this up. I have to ask about the front groups for psychiatric medicine, like Teen Screen and CHAD. Give us a rundown on these groups and what they do.

Dr. Baughman: Teen Screen is coming to us out of Columbia University, once an esteemed medical school uptown from NYU, which was also once a proud scientific institute. David Schaefer, the psychiatrist who has authored Teen Screen, along with the pharmaceutical sponsors, is not content with the rate of growth of psychiatric poisoning in this country, so they want to make it mandatory that all kids in our captive population, our schools to take diagnostic tests.

Mike: So they think four out of every 10 kids…

Dr. Baughman: That is probably a low yield for Teen Screen. I would think that more of these screens would have a 60, 70 or even 80 percent positive diagnostic rate like the adult ADHD screen run by New York University at one of the Helmsley Hotels. As long as they've got enough friends in Congress and in the White House to write these things into law, they're going to carry on. Teen Screen is very much a product of the White House. The President's new Freedom Commission on Mental Health launched the notion of Teen Screen.

Mike: Which is mandatory mental health screening, right?

Dr. Baughman: Yes. I think Illinois already passed it and made it law. They are not asking parents whether or not they want their kids screened. This is Big Brother to the max. This is worse than anything Stalin could have imagined. This population had better wake up; the implications go far beyond the drugging of our normal school children.

Mike: That leads me to my final question: How does all of this ever end? How does this return to normal? When is the fraud exposed? How long will it take? If the pharmaceutical companies are so powerful and control so many big players, how does this ever get exposed?

Dr. Baughman: Exactly. Right now there is a pharmaceutical company lobbyist for every member of Congress and probably three or four for every senator. Who knows how many for the president? It is really a horror story unfolding. When I started medicine in 1964, I thought we were a wonderful profession. We didn't have to compromise ourselves by inventing things to do. That has changed 100 percent. The medical profession is a disgrace today.

Mike: Again for those reading, you are hearing from Dr. Fred Baughman, pediatric neurologist and M.D. Your web site is ADHDfraud.org. What is the title of your upcoming book?

Dr. Baughman: "The ADHD Fraud: How Psychiatry Makes Patients of Normal Children."

Mike: Okay, that's a title that we will be looking forward to. Any last thoughts, Dr. Baughman?

Dr. Baughman: Yes, you might also consider getting a DVD production by Gary Null Associates in New York City, called "Drugging Our Children." I was interviewed for it in a powerful hard-hitting video view of what we've talked about here. I also have a video that I produced with footage from the 1998 ADHD consensus conference. My video is called "ADHD Total 100% Fraud. It can be purchased through my web site.

Mike: If you have any new items, books or videos, send them my way. I will be happy to get that out to the readers.

Dr. Baughman: I sure will.

###

  
Stay informed! FREE subscription to the Health Ranger's email newsletter
Breaking news • Natural cures • Food safety alerts • Food discounts • Herbal remedies • Health freedom
Join two million monthly readers. Email privacy 100% protected. Unsubscribe at any time.   

Articles Related to This Article:
• The ADHD Scam and the Mass Drugging of Schoolchildren (Transcript)

• Child-centered marketing causing kids to carry unhealthy food habits into adulthood

• Human medical experimentation on children: The exploitation of poor children by Big Pharma (part two)

• Vaccines and Medical Experiments on Children, Minorities, Woman and Inmates (1845 - 2007)

• The great thimerosal cover-up: Mercury, vaccines, autism and your child's health

• Top 20 things that are more dangerous to children than lead paint in Mattel toys
  
Related video from NaturalNews.TV

Your NaturalNews.TV video could be here.
Upload your own videos at NaturalNews.TV (FREE)



About the author: Mike Adams is a natural health author and award-winning journalist with a mission to teach personal and planetary health to the public He has authored and published thousands of articles, interviews, consumers guides, and books on topics like health and the environment, reaching millions of readers with information that is saving lives and improving personal health around the world. Adams is an independent journalist with strong ethics who does not get paid to write articles about any product or company. In 2010, Adams co-founded NaturalNews.TV, a natural health video sharing site that has now grown in popularity. He's also a noted pioneer in the email marketing software industry, having been the first to launch an HTML email newsletter technology that has grown to become a standard in the industry. Adams also serves as the executive director of the Consumer Wellness Center, a non-profit consumer protection group, and practices nature photography, Capoeira, martial arts and organic gardening. He's also author of numerous health books published by Truth Publishing and is the creator of several consumer-oriented grassroots campaigns, including the Spam. Don't Buy It! campaign, and the free downloadable Honest Food Guide. He also created the free reference sites HerbReference.com and HealingFoodReference.com. Adams believes in free speech, free access to nutritional supplements and the ending of corporate control over medicines, genes and seeds. Known as the 'Health Ranger,' Adams' personal health statistics and mission statements are located at www.HealthRanger.org

Have comments on this article? Post them here:

0 people have commented on this article.
Related Articles:
• The ADHD Scam and the Mass Drugging of Schoolchildren (Transcript)

• Child-centered marketing causing kids to carry unhealthy food habits into adulthood

• Human medical experimentation on children: The exploitation of poor children by Big Pharma (part two)

• Vaccines and Medical Experiments on Children, Minorities, Woman and Inmates (1845 - 2007)

• The great thimerosal cover-up: Mercury, vaccines, autism and your child's health

• Top 20 things that are more dangerous to children than lead paint in Mattel toys

  
Take Action: Support NaturalNews.com
Email this article to a friend

Share this article on: NewsVine | digg | del.icio.us

Permalink to this article:
http://www.naturalnews.com/020227_ADHD_psychiatry.html
Reprinting this article: Non-commercial use OK, cite NaturalNews.com with clickable link.

Embed article link: (copy HTML code below):
Neurologist Dr. Fred Baughman talks about the fraud of ADHD and the poisoning of U.S. children
  
Most Popular
Today | Week | Month | Year

    Warning: Perfect storm conditions now in place for Big Government to allow (or even stage) terrorism attacks in America
    Doctors claim super model could be killing herself with coconut oil
    New Hampshire family builds off-grid house and farm powered by solar, proves self-sufficiency enhances quality of life
    Potatoes may help reduce blood pressure without affecting weight
    Phthalates should be avoided in personal care products
    A counter-intuitive strategy for long-term relationship success
    EPA declares hay a pollutant in effort to drive small, mid-sized family cattle ranchers out of business
    U.S. doctors steeped in financial ties - drug money from Big Pharma
    Mother Nature's thirst-quenching sports drink comes from twigs and leaves: Rooibos
    Feds raid Obama-touted solar panel company, 900 American workers lose jobs after company files bankruptcy
    Never going back: Air travel changed for worse, forever after 9/11
    Amid unraveling economy, thieves nab tractor trailer filled with 21 tons of meat scraps

See all Top Headlines...


The NaturalNews Talk Hour presents "Breaking News - Vitamin D, Cancer plus much more" with Dr. Marc Sorenson. Simply enter your email address (below) to receive the call-in details:
Enter Your Email:

Across the Web

    AGAIN: Cargill recalls turkey after salmonella, AT SAME PLANT  (AP/Sacramento Bee)
    WOW! Krugman defiant; Years of Shame  (NY Times)
    Rebuilt WTC site not to be finished until 2016, 8 years past schedule  (Time Magazine)
    Texas: 24 NEW wildfires, worst droubt since 1895!  (CNN)
    Survival gear checklist - 15 key Items to start with  (Backdoor Survival)
    UPLIFTING: United Way, progressive pharmicies in Mo. providing school kids multivitamins  (CBS News 12)
    California approves Amazon, e-comerce tax compromise  (Seeking Alpha)
    Amazing human being Denis Leary reflects on 9/11, heroes, charity  (Yahoo)
    6 frightening technologies that dehumanize war  (Activist Post)
    UnConstiutional maneuver by Senate allows $500 BILLION debt limit raise  (Wall Street Journal)
    8 Star Trek gadgets that are now a reality  (Mashable)
    Cherokee Nation expels descendants of slaves from tribe  (AP/Yahoo)
    Chef Jamie Oliver's Milk War  (The New Yorker)
    Mayor Bloomberg's Ode to 9/11 Heroes: You're not invited!  (Wall Street Journal)
    The real reason Google acquired Zagat  (The Street)
    BoA first claimed 3,500 job cuts, increases it to 40,000!  (AFP)
    Hurricane caused, sewage-tainted floodwaters threaten health  (AP/Washington Times)
    Human error? Power coming back on in Southwest  (CNN)
    Fortress New York: Post 9/11 police state; own army, navy, tanks  (CBS New York)
    Cell towers, the 3am alarm clock  (Townsend Letter)
    Prince Charles warns of weather, social apocalypse  (Telegraph UK)
    Nuclear reactors shutter; 5 MILLION without electricity in Southwest  (AP/Yahoo)
    Power outage slams San Diego  (NBC)
    Hospital group lobbies Congress to raise Medicare age  (Politico)
    What happened to the modern tomato?  (CNN)

More News...
Also on NaturalNews:
• Health Ranger Videos
• Activist music
• CounterThink Cartoons
• Food documentaries
• FREE Special Reports
•

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/020227.html#ixzz1XiNmpqhW

FRED BAUGHMAN -"THE FDA IS PURVEYOR OF THE 'CHEMICAL IMBALANCE' LIE AND THIS MUST CHANGE."."

There Is No Such Thing as a Psychiatric Disorder/Disease/Chemical Imbalance

    Fred Baughman
  El Cajon, California, United States of America


Published: July 25, 2006

Copyright: © 2006 Fred Baughman. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Funding: The author received no specific funding for this article.

Competing interests: FB is a retired neurologist/child neurologist, board certified, with no financial conflicts of interest, and with no affiliations with organizations or institutions having such conflicts. Formerly FB was a March of Dimes/National Foundation scholar and published considerably from a private practice base. FB is author of the book The ADHD Fraud—How Psychiatry Makes “Patients” of Normal Children. FB has testified widely about the absence of proof that any psychiatric disorders have been validated as objective abnormalities/diseases. Most recently FB testified at hearings at the US Food and Drug Administration (March 2006) and before the Congress of Mexico (March 2006).

(E-mail: fredbaughmanmd@cox.net)

In her recent PLoS Medicine article, Christine Phillips writes: “ADHD [attention deficit hyperactivity disorder] joins dyslexia and glue ear as disorders that are considered significant primarily because of their effects on educational performance” [1]. A “disorder” is “a disturbance of function, structure, or both,” and thus, the equivalent of an objective abnormality/disease [2]. In neurologically normal children, dyslexia cannot be proved to be a disorder/disease. “Glue ear,” however, is otitis media, an objective abnormality/ disease. Phillips continues: “In the case of ADHD, there has been a complex, often heated debate in the public domain about the verity of the illness,” but proceeds, without an answer, to consider “the roles of teachers as brokers for ADHD and its treatment.”

In 1948, “neuropsychiatry” was divided into “neurology,” dealing with diseases, and “psychiatry,” dealing with emotions and behaviors [3]. If there is a macroscopic, microscopic, or chemical abnormality, a disease is present. Nowhere in the brains or bodies of children said to have ADHD or any other psychiatric diagnosis has a disorder/disease been confirmed. Psychiatric drugs appeared in the fifties. Psychiatry and the pharmaceutical industry authored the “chemical imbalance” market strategy: they would call all things psychological “chemical imbalances” needing “chemical balancers”—pills.

At the September 29, 1970, hearing on Federal Involvement in the Use of Behavior Modification Drugs on Grammar School Children, Ronald Lipman of the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA), argued: “hyperkinesis is a medical syndrome. It should be properly diagnosed by a medical doctor” [4].

In 1986, Nasrallah et al. [5] reported brain atrophy in adult males treated with amphetamines as children, concluding: “since all of the HK/MBD [hyperkinetic/minimal brain dysfunction] patients had been treated with psychostimulants, cortical atrophy may be a long-term adverse effect of this treatment.”

At the 1998 National Institutes of Health (NIH) Consensus Development Conference on ADHD, Carey [6] stated: “The ADHD behaviors are assumed to be largely or entirely due to abnormal brain function. The DSM-IV does not say so but textbooks and journals do.... What is now most often described as ADHD...appears to be a set of normal behavioral variations.”

However Swanson and Castellanos [7], having reviewed the structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) research, testified: “Recent investigations provide converging evidence that a refined phenotype of ADHD/HKD (hyperkinetic disorder) is characterized by reduced size in specific neuroanatomical regions of the frontal lobes and basal ganglia.” I challenged Swanson, asking: “Why didn't you mention that virtually all of the ADHD subjects were on stimulant therapy—the likely cause of their brain atrophy?” [8] Swanson confessed this was so—that there had been no such studies of ADHD-untreated cohorts.

The Consensus Conference Panel concluded: “We do not have a valid test for ADHD... there are no data to indicate that ADHD is a brain malfunction” [9]. (This wording appeared in the version of the final statement of the Consensus Conference Panel distributed at the press conference in the final part of the Consensus Conference, November 18, 1998. This wording, which appeared for an indeterminate time on the NIH Web site, was subsequently removed and replaced with wording claiming “validity” for ADHD.)

In 2002, Castellanos et al. [10] published the one and only MRI study of an ADHD-untreated group. However, because the ADHD-untreated patients were two years younger than the controls, the study was invalid, leaving stimulant treatment, not the never-validated disorder, ADHD, the likely cause of the brain atrophy.

In 2002, Daniel Weinberger, of the National Institute of Mental Health, claimed “major psychiatric diseases” are associated with “subtle but objectively characterizable changes” but could reference not a single proof (quoted in [11]).

In 2002, the Advertisement Commission of Holland [12] determined that the claim that ADHD is an inborn brain dysfunction was misleading and enjoined the Brain Foundation of the Netherlands to cease such representations.

In 2003, Ireland prohibited GlaxoSmithKline from claiming that the antidepressant Paxil “works by bringing serotonin levels back to normal.” Wayne Goodman of the FDA acknowledged that claims that selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors correct a serotonin imbalance go “too far,” but had the temerity to suggest that “this is reasonable shorthand for expressing a chemically or brain-based problem” (quoted in [13]).

At an FDA hearing on March 23, 2006, I testified: “Saying any psychiatric diagnosis ‘is a brain-based problem and that the medications are normalizing function’ is an anti-scientific, pro-drug lie” [14]. Yet this has become standard practice throughout medicine, for example, at the American Psychiatric Association [15], American Medical Association [16], American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, American Academy of Pediatrics, Child Neurology Society, American Academy of Family Physicians [17], FDA [13], and virtually all US government health-care agencies.

Journal articles [6], press releases, ads [18], drug inserts, and research informed consent documents say, or infer, that psychological diagnoses are abnormalities/diseases. All patients and research participants with psychological problems are led to believe they have an abnormality/disease, biasing them in favor of medical interventions, and against nonmedical interventions (e.g., love, will power, or talk therapy), which presume, as is the case, that the individual is physically and medically normal and without need of a medical/pharmaceutical intervention.

The FDA is the agency most responsible for conveying the facts needed by the public to make risk versus benefit and informed consent decisions. Instead—by protecting industry, not the public—the FDA is a purveyor of the psychiatric “disease” and “chemical imbalance” lie. This must change.
References Top

    Phillips CB (2006) Medicine goes to school: Teachers as sickness brokers for ADHD. PLoS Med 3: e182. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.0030182.
    Stedman TL (1990) Stedman's medical dictionary, 25th ed. Baltimore: Williams and Wilkins. 1784 p.
    Cohen MM, editor. (1998) American Academy of Neurology: The first 50 years, 1948–1998. St. Paul (Minnesota): American Academy of Neurology. 338 p.
    Lipman R1970 Federal involvement in the use of behavior modification drugs on grammar school children of the right to privacy inquiry.November Hearing before a Subcommittee of the Committee on Government Operations House of Representatives, Ninety-First Congress, Second Session . Find this article online
    Nasrallah HA, Loney J, Olson SC, McCalley-Whitters M, Kramer J, et al. (1986) Cortical atrophy in young adults with a history of hyperactivity in childhood. Psychiatry Res 17: 241–246. Find this article online
    Carey WBIs attention deficit hyperactivity disorder a valid disorder?. In: Program and Abstracts, NIH Consensus Development Conference on Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder; 16–18 November 1998; Bethesda, Maryland. (1998) pp. 33–36.
    Swanson J, Castellanos FXBiological bases of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Program and Abstracts, NIH Consensus Development Conference on Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder; 16–18 November 1998; Bethesda, Maryland. (1998) pp. 37–42.
    Baughman FAADHD—Total, 100% fraud [video]. Produced from the official video of the NIH Consensus Development Conference on Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder; 16–18 November 1998; Bethesda, Maryland. (1999)
    1998 National Institutes of Health Consensus Development Conference Statement.November Find this article online
    Castellanos FX, Lee PP, Sharp W, Jeffries NO, Greenstein DK, et al. (2002) Developmental trajectories of brain volume abnormalities in children and adolescents with attention- deficit/hyperactivity disorder. JAMA 288: 1740–1748. Find this article online
    McBride G2002 Neuroimaging advances offer new data on stroke detection and the genetics of mental illness. Neurol Today June26–28. Find this article online
    Holland's Advertisement Code Commission on ADHD In the case: Nederland Comite voor de Rechten van de Mens (CCHR), domiciled in Amsterdam, plaintiff; The Brain Foundation Netherlands, domiciled in the Hague, defendant. Decision of the Advertisement Code Commission (Chamber II) 4 July 2002 . Find this article online
    Meek C (2006) SSRI ads questioned. CMAJ 174: 754. Find this article online
    Baughman FA2006 Mar 23. Fred Baughman's testimony to the Psychopharmacologic Drugs Advisory Committee. Washington (D. C.): Department of Health and Human Services. http://www.fda.gov/ohrms/dockets/ac/06/t​ranscripts/2006-4212T1-Part1.htm. Accessed 13 June 2006 .
    American Psychiatric Association (1994) Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders DSM-IV, 4th ed. Washington (D. C.): American Psychiatric Association. 886 p.
    Baughman FA (1999) Treatment of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. JAMA 281: 1490. Find this article online
    Baughman FA (2001) Diagnosis and evaluation of the child with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Pediatrics 107: 1239. Find this article online
    Lacasse JR, Leo J (2005) Serotonin and depression: A disconnect between the advertisements and the scientific literature. PLoS Med 2: e392. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.0020392.