ADHD fraud/ ADHD Not a Real Disease, Says Leading Neuroscientist

ADHD fraud

 

Fred A. Baughman Jr., M. D.

Neurologist, Pediatric Neurology

Private Practice

fredbaughmanmd@cox.net

 

 

 

 

The AMA Council on Scientific Affairs

 

With no proof that ADHD is a disease with a confirmatory, physical abnormality, the ADHD “epidemic,” has grown from 150,000 in 1970, to five million in 1997. According to the Drug Enforcement Administration, Ritalin production, in the US, rose 700%, between 1990 and 1997 and, the AMA, Council on Scientific Affairs has seen fit to conclude:  “…there is little evidence of widespread overdiagnosis or misdiagnosis of ADHD or of widespread over prescription of  methylphenidate”(Goldman,  et  al. 1998).

 

Every patient’s right of informed consent requires a complete, honest portrayal both of the condition to be treated (including it’s course, untreated) and of the treatment(s) proposed (and how it/they will alter the course of the condition).  Lacking either, the informed consent would be incomplete--invalid.  Few,  if any, questions about ADHD can be answered without an honest answer to the question:  “Is ADHD a disease with a confirmatory  physical (including chemical)  abnormality, or  isn’t it?

Is It a Disease or Isn’t It?

 

All physicians—psychiatrists included, complete a course of study of disease—pathology.  They know, full well, that it is the physician’s first duty, patient-by-patient, to determine whether the patient has an actual disease or has not—the “disease”/ “no disease” determination.  We learn that substantial numbers of patients seek help from their physicians for what are “emotional,” “psychological,” or “psychiatric” symptoms, due to the stresses of everyday life.  Such patients have no disease per se (ruled out by finding no abnormalities or pathology— nothing objective on physical examination, laboratory  testing,  x-ray,  scanning,  etc.). 

 

There were few claims by psychiatry in the sixties and seventies of a biologic basis of psychiatric disorders (i.e., that they were “diseases”).  Such claims, without scientific evidence, began, in earnest, in the eighties and nineties, with the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-III-R (DSM-III-R) and DSM-IV.  ADHD has become  psychiatry’s  number  one, “biologically-based” “disease.”

Biopsychiatry’s Intent to Deceive

 

Writing in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), in 1995, psychiatry spokesmen, Marzuk and Barchas (1995) stated: “Perhaps the most significant conceptual shift (from DSM-III-R, 1987, to DSM-IV, 1994) was the elimination of the rubric organic mental disorders, which had suggested improperly that most psychiatric disorders…had no organic basis.” Notice that these authors have assumed, but not proven, that “most psychiatric disorders” have an organic basis, making it improper for anyone to suggest otherwise.  They would shift the burden of proof to those who doubt and question, hardly in keeping with science.  What they and the American Psychiatric Association (APA), with it’s DSM-IV, have done, was to absolve psychiatry of every physician’s obligation to make a fundamental, patient-by-patient, “organic”/  “not organic,” “disease”/ “no disease” determination.  They have absolved themselves, and anyone wishing to join them in such diagnosing, of having to demonstrate an abnormality—pathology,  by way of  proving  that  psychiatric “disorders”/ “diseases” are actual  diseases.

 

In fact, the essential first step in all diagnosis, even in the diagnosis of psychiatric disorders, is to make the fundamental “Is it a disease or isn’t it?” determination.  This determination is usually made by physicians other than psychiatrists; usually by those referring patients to the psychiatrist (or psychologist, or other mental health professional).  What psychiatrists do from that point on is nothing more or less than semantic classification based upon subjective symptoms alone, in patients already-proven to have no disease.  The absence of organic disease, over time, stands as the strongest evidence that a patient’s symptoms are psychogenic.

 

In 1986, Ross, a psychiatrist, chided: “…dealing with symptoms or syndromes as if they were specific disease reflects a trend in psychiatry to regard mental illnesses as biological entities…But in this surrealistic world of pseudo-entities, the psychiatris abdicated  reality  to embrace biological  reductionism.”.

 

In 1990, Pam, a psychologist, supposing psychiatrists naïve, sought to impose scientific standards.  He wrote:

 

…any studies that do not meet standards for proper research procedures or interpretation of data must not be accepted for publication or, if already published must be discredited within the professional literature…the possibility that that emotional  experience e (love, hate, fear, grief) may be physiologically non-specific  gets short shrift… If each emotion is not physiologically distinctive, there can be no biological marker for each type or subtype of emotional pathology, and thus most current research would be methodologically inappropriate…the preponderance of research  contributed  by biological psychiatry up to the present is questionable or even invalidated by the criticisms just made.

 

With research and the peer-reviewed scientific literature substantially or wholly (as in the case of drug-related research) funded by industry—who speaks for science?  To what extent are scientific findings muted?  Perverted?  Are diseases invented where they don’t exist?  Treatments?  Acknowledgments  appearing  on published  articles regarding research funding and sponsorship are wholly inadequate.  Readers have every right to detailed knowledge regarding research funding and the researchers as well.  Without such information,  informed  consent  is not fully informed.

Psychopharmacology: Invented Diseases, Big Business

The American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual has grown from 112 mental disorders in its initial, 1952 edition, to 163 in the 1968, DSM-II, to 224 in the 1980, DSM-III; 253 in the 1987, DSM-III-R, and, 374 in the 1994, DSM-IV.  That there is more to the explosion of psychiatric “diseases” than scientific naiveté is obvious.  To the extent that such research and its dissemination abrogates informed consent and becomes  standard  practice; is it not fraud?  That it is a joint,  psychiatric-pharmaceutical  industry strategy is obvious.

 

An ad placed by “America’s Pharmaceutical Research Companies” in Newsweek, October 7, 1996, read: “A chemical that triggers mental illness is now being used to stop it.” Here again, is the “big lie.” There is no mental illness with a proven chemical abnormality.  In their scheme of things, however, scientific facts are less important, by far, than that the public at large becomes a believer in the “chemical imbalance”—chemical “balancer” (pill) view of mental health.  When and in which board-room did they meet to adopt their  “disease”-“chemical imbalance”-“pill” model of all human emotional distress?

Biopsychiatry’s  researchers are aware that without proven diseases,  syndromes (in a medical sense) or phenotypes; the “disease” and “control” groups are both physically normal and indistinguishable.  They know from the outset that their research is destined  to prove nothing and to remain forever theoretical.

 

Pam (1990) asks: “…how can we account for the tendency to seriously compromise research and review standards within a medical discipline (all of psychiatry, its governing bodies and journals)  known for its commitment to the scientific method?” …and, ventures  an answer: “The sociology of knowledge developed by Mannheim (1936) postulates that all intellectual  systems—science included—are  influenced by special interest and social considerations;  a body of information is never unrelated to a political-economic context…”.

The AMA Council on Scientific Affairs--10 Years Ago

 

In 1989, the same AMA Council on Scientific Affairs, evaluated “dyslexia,” a.k.a. “specific reading disability,” and duly, and scientifically, concluded there was no satisfactory definition—that it was not a disease.  Why, today, in 1998, does the Council fail to provide a forthright, scientific answer to the same question about ADHD?  Is it a disease with a confirmatory  physical  abnormality,  or isn’t it?

 

What factors have changed which allowed the Council to speak forthrightly—scientifically on the issue of “dyslexia” in 1989, but not on ADHD, in 1998?  Is industry control in medicine more nearly complete today?  How often are scientific conclusions  not  friendly to the “bottom line” published?  Quashed?

 

J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904-1967), “father” of America’s first atom bomb, reminds us: “The scientist is free, and must be free to ask any question, to doubt any assertion,  to seek for any evidence,  to correct any errors.”

 

The changes of diagnostic criteria from DSM-III to DSM-III-R to DSM-IV were changes wrought by consensus, in committee, not changes dictated, as science would have it, by the further reports of observant, scientific physicians or by the findings of basic science researchers investigating already-confirmed (by virtue of a confirmatory, characteristic abnormality),  real  diseases (or medical  syndromes).  It must be recognized that research on “diseases,” never validated as such, in which subjects—never proved to be abnormal and distinguishable from normal “controls,” is doomed from the outset to prove nothing.  When such research is continued,  nonetheless,  and remains the basis for persistent claims of a biological  basis—it is deceptive and fraudulent?   

 

ADHD, like the vast majority of psychiatric disorders/diseases, was never discovered or validated by demonstration of a confirmatory physical (including chemical) abnormality.  Rather,  it was invented in-committee  at  the American  Psychiatric Association in 1980  and has been revised on two separate occasions since, in 1987 and 1994.

The Lament from Biopsychiatry

 

In a 1995 review of the neuro-imaging literature on ADHD, Ernst (1995) commented:

 

The definition of ADHD has changed over time.  This change has contributed to the selection of research samples with differing clinical characteristics, making comparisons among studies difficult…samples of children with ADHD who were diagnosed according to DSM-III-R (1987) criteria include children who do not meet DSM-III (1980) criteria. 

 

What Ernst pointed out is that the ADD of DSM-III (1980), the ADHD of DSM-III-R (1987), and the ADHD of DSM-IV (1994) are 3 separate,  incomparable entities.  Moreover,  the ADHD of DSM-IV has been  divided  (also by consensus-altered  diagnostic criteria) into three sub-types: (a) hyperactive-impulsive, (b) inattentive, and (c ) combined—none comparable to the other or,  to the ADD of DSM-III (1980) or the ADHD of DSM-III-R (1987). If the neuro-imaging  literature for each is separate and incomparable,  then the same is true of the literature on biochemistry, genetics, epidemiology,  co-morbidity,  psychopharmacology,  etc.  None are comparable, one with the other.  Is this science?

 

Why do ADHD experts regularly extol the sheer volume and longevity of their research record, as if this alone, as opposed to particular proofs, were what mattered.  For example,  the Council  Report (1998) states: “ADHD is a childhood neuropsychiatric syndrome that has been studied thoroughly over the past 40 years.”  ADHD, as such, did not appear  until the publication of DSM-III-R in 1987.  Nor have I mentioned its many pre-DSM-III, 1980, conceptualizations.  Consider: “The high frequency of ‘soft’ neurologic findings led to designating the condition ‘minimal brain dysfunction’, with the expectation that  a consistent  neurologic lesion or set of lesions would eventually be found” (Clemens & Peters 1962).

 

Typical of biopsychiatry, “minimal brain dysfunction,” circa, 1960-1970, better known by it’s acronym “MBD,” was itself re-conceptualized before “a consistent neurologic lesion or set of lesions” could be found.  Nor was it the same or comparable, to any subsequent conceptualization—another  chapter  of  the research record  down the drain.

ADHD: Every Child a Patient

 

Although devoid of science, the “invention” and “revisions” of ADHD have enjoyed incredible marketplace success.  In 1985 there were 0.57 million stimulant prescriptions (nearly all of them for ADHD), and by 1994 there were 2.87 million (Pincus, et. al. 1998).  One current  estimate (by the DEA)  puts the frequency,  today,  at 5 million.

 

            I am acquainted with a young father in Tennessee whose son, now 8 and on Ritalin, was one of half of his entire kindergarten class referred for a diagnosis of ADHD.  Furthermore, the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) aggregate production quota (APQ) for methylphenidate, the main medication with which to treat ADHD, increased 7-fold from 1990-1997.  Nonetheless, we have the AMA Council on Scientific Affairs concluding: “there is little evidence of widespread overdiagnosis or misdiagnosis…or of widespread  overprescription  of methylphenidate.”  Are their conclusions justified?

One Physician’s Quest for an Answer

 

Diseases are natural occurrences in the plant and animal world.  Scientific physicians,  veterinarians,  botanists,  and others observe, describe, and validate the pathology (abnormality) making them diseases.  Diseases are not conceptualized in committee  or decided  upon by consensus,  as biological  psychiatry  would  have it.

 

In 35 years as a private practice, adult/child neurologist, making “disease”/ “no disease” determinations  daily,  I have discovered and described real diseases but have found myself  unable to validate ADHD,  by whatever  name,  as an actual disease.

In 1971, I discovered the curly hair-anklyoblepharon (fused eyelids)-nail dysplasia syndrome (CHANDS).  Its description was published in the Birth Defects: Original Article Series (Baughman 1971).  In 1979, Toriello,  Established  its autosomal recessive mode of transmission and published our findings in the Journal of Medical Genetics  (Toriello, et. al.. 1979).  In 1959, Turcot suggested  that the combination of polyposis of the colon with gliomas of the brain was an autosomal recessive trait  (Turcot, et al. 1959).  In 1969, Baughman described the second, “confirmatory” example of the glioma-polyposis syndrome—Turcot’s syndrome (Baughman, et al., 1969). Anyone asking whether or not CHANDS exists, whether or not it has been proven to be “genetic” or, whether or not Turcot’s syndrome  exists,  can look up the references and access the proofs.  Such is the way of medical  science—with  the notable  exception  of  biological  psychiatry.

 

On September 23, 1993, I testified in hearings at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) research on ADHD, conduct disorder (CD) and oppositional-defiant disorder (ODD):

 

If, as I am convinced, these entities are not diseases, it would be unethical to initiate research to evaluate biological interventions—unethical and fatally flawed scientifically.  That such unethical, unscientific research has, and is, going on, should be the focus of investigations.

 

My testimony, and with it all consideration of the fundamental  “disease”/ “no disease” issue, was effectively  expunged  from their 1994 final report.  Moreover, they have refused to share with me informed consent documents used in such research which would have had to state how they characterize ADHD, CD and ODD to parents.

 

And All the Other Biopsychiatric Diseases, Too?

 

Regarding their re-conceptualization of psychiatric “disorders” as “diseases, Goodwin (a former NIMH director) (1988). writes: “Physicians are consulted about the problem  of alcoholism  and  therefore alcoholism becomes… a disease.”  He does, however, acknowledge “a narrow definition of disease that requires the presence of a biological abnormality.”  Kety and Matthysse (1988) write:  “… the recent literature does not provide the hoped-for clarification of the catecholamine hypotheses, nor does compelling evidence emerge for other biological differences that may characterize the brains of patients with mental disease.”  The Congressional Office of Technology Assessment (1992) concludes: “Mental disorders are classified on the basis of symptoms because there are as yet no biological  markers  or laboratory tests for them.”

 

Arthur C. Clarke,  scientific  thinker,  author  of  “2001: A Space Odyssey” reminds us:  “Science, unlike politics or diplomacy, does not depend on consensus or expediency—it progresses by open-minded probing, rigorous questioning, independent thought and, when the need arises, being bold enough to say that the emperor has no clothes.”  Biological psychiatry has “no clothes!” ADHD has “no clothes!”  There being no scientific explanations, we must look elsewhere for answers to the epidemic drugging of US school children in the name of ADHD.

I Try to Find Out about ADHD

 

From 1993 to the present I have written to leading agencies and researchers asking to be referred to the one or few articles in the peer-reviewed, scientific literature that constitute proof that ADHD is a disease or (medical) syndrome with a confirmatory, physical abnormality.  On December 24, 1994, Paul Leber, MD, of the FDA responded:  “…as yet no distinctive pathophysiology for the disorder has been delineated.”  On October 25, 1995, Gene R. Haislip of the DEA wrote: “We are also unaware that ADHD has been validated as a biologic/organic syndrome or disease.”  On September 1l, 1996, as if unfamiliar with the concept of scientific proof, Joyce Moscaritola, MD, Medical Affairs Vice President, Ciba-Geigy responded: “A comprehensive computer search of the literature yielded several articles which discuss the various hypotheses for the etiology (cause) of ADHD.”

 

Turning to the top ADHD researchers in the country (those at the NIMH) I sent, by Fed-Ex, the following request, individually, to Doctors Peter S. Jensen, F. Xavier Castellanos, Alan J. Zametkin and Judith L Rapoport, all on the same day: November 3, 1995: “I would like you to direct me, specifically, to those reports in the literature which constitute proof that ADHD is a disease or a syndrome and thus organic/biologic.”  The response came not from any one of the four to whom I had directed the question—all purveyors  of the proposition that  ADHD is a “disease” and that the children are abnormal, but from L. Eugene Arnold, M.Ed., MD, December 8, 1995, after consultation with the four.  Not until the final paragraph of a two pages letter, replete with 35 references, having nothing to do with my question, did Arnold get to the question: “However, I suspect you are more interested in evidence that ADHD is organic/biologic…The evidence here is more nascent, with exciting new reports at each professional meeting.  It is very likely that multiple  causes will be established.”  This,  of course,  was a non-answer.

 

The 1995, Report of the International Narcotics Control Board [24] voiced concern regarding the diagnosis of ADD:

 

The INCB requests the authorities of the United States to continue to carefully monitor future developments in the diagnosis of ADD in children…in order to ensure that these substances are prescribed in accordance with sound medical practice, as required under article 9, paragraph 2, of the 1971 Convention.

 

On June 7, 1996  I wrote to the INCB asking: “With no confirmation that so-called attention-deficit disorder with or without hyperactivity (ADHD) is a disease, a “discrete diagnostic entity” or anything organic or biologic, how could it possibly be sound medical practice?” Replying on July 3, 1996, INCB Secretary, Herbert Schaep, expressed satisfaction with the newly-launched Ciba-Geigy campaign to inform the community about the abuse potential of methylphenidate (Ritalin) but left the more fundamental question of the validity of a ADD/ADHD as a disease/medical syndrome un-addressed.

 

Conner, he of the parent-teacher behavior scales,  replied on September 15, 1998.  He enclosed  his April, 1997, article : “Is ADHD a disease?” by way of response.  Therein, he summarized:

 

…we see that there is no agreement on a core psychological defect, anatomic locus, neurochemical or genetic basis, or neuropsychological pattern, that is characteristic of ADHD… What is wrong with our approach…that we should have so little success in identifying a specific marker for the ADHD disease, almost a century after George Still identified the disorder?

 

On September 15, 1997,  I wrote to Director of National Drug Control Policy, General (ret.) Barry R. McCaffrey and to the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, Donna Shalala,  charging:

 

that ADHD—the  fraudulent, never-validated, “disease”—was fabricated by experts at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)” and that “On no less than four occasions (by registered mail as well) I have asked NIMH experts, Doctors Peter S. Jensen, F. Xavier Castellanos, Judith L. Rapoport  and Alan J. Zametkin to refer me to those articles…tha t prove that ADHD is a “disease” (or a medical syndrome) with a confirmatory,  characteristic  abnormality (pathology).

 

At long last, I elicited a reply to my question—or so I thought—from the one person, who,  more than any other,  speaks of and for ADHD and oversees ADHD research in the US—Peter S. Jensen, MD, Chief, Developmental Psychopathology Research Branch, NIMH, NIH, Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). Dr. Jensen urged that I: “note within the pages of the prestigious British journal Lancet an article will soon be forthcoming (Swanson, et al. 1998) that reviews all of the biologic evidence for the establishment of ADHD as a bona fide disorder…”.  What Dr. Jensen failed to state, once again, is whether or not the  “soon…forthcoming” Lancet article, or any, anywhere in the peer-reviewed literature on ADHD, yet constitutes proof of an abnormality within the child—one that can be tested for and found patient-by-patient, one proving that we are not drugging millions of normal children.

 

On December 5, 1997,  I wrote and faxed James M. Swanson, Ph.D., Director, Child Development Center, Department of Pediatrics, University of California, Irvine, and author of the “soon…forthcoming” Lancet article:

 

please send me a copy or reprint of the article referred to by Dr. Jensen in his letter to me of October 12, 1997 (enclosed).  Can you cite final, confirmatory proof that ADHD is a disease/medical syndrome with a definite, discernible (patient by patient) physical or chemical abnormality/ marker?

 

Getting no response from Swanson,  I re-sent my original letter (that of December 5, 1997) on January 12, 1998, this time by registered mail.  In so doing, I learned that the address I had been using was correct and that the registered letter had been received and signed for.  But still, no response  to my scientific,  collegial  inquiry.

 

Next,  Swanson appeared  as a substitute speaker  at a meeting I was attending in San Diego, that of the American Society for Adolescent Psychiatry,  March 5-8, 1998.  He spoke, among other things, of the MRI brain scan research of Castellanos, (Castellanos, et  al.1996, 1998) and Filipek (1997), alleged to show brain atrophy in subjects with ADHD, but not in controls.  I spoke from the audience,  pointing  out that 93% of the subjects in the Castellanos  studies had been on chronic stimulant  therapy,  and inquired as to the stimulant  status of those in the Filipek study.  Swanson  (1998) acknowledged that  Filipek ,  also utilized  ADHD subjects who had been on chronic stimulant therapy—an acknowledgment  nowhere to be found in a review of this research  either in the in the Lancet article  (1998) or in the more recent  Report of the Council of Scientific Affairs of the American  Medical Association (Goldman,  et. al., 1998).  Here, we had strong, replicated  evidence  that  chronic  stimulant  therapy (methylphenidate, amphetamine) causes brain atrophy, not confirmation of an ADHD phenotype at all, as we were led to believe.

 

Next--much to my surprise--came the answer to the ADHD “disease”/ “no disease” question.    Swanson  (from the tape recording of the session):

 

“I would like to have an objective diagnosis for the disorder (ADHD).  Right now psychiatric diagnosis is completely subjective…We would like to have biological tests—a dream of psychiatry for many years… I think we will validate it.  I do not  think these drugs are dangerous or addictive when used this way.”

 

            “I think we will validate it,” he said.  At long last—an open, honest, truly scientific appraisal from one within the ADHD industry!  At last, I had my answer from Swanson, and from the greater ADHD industry.  He thinks they will validate ADHD.  What he neglected to say was how he describes ADHD, today, in obtaining informed consent from the parents of children he treats with stimulants and from those of children in their research studies using positron emission tomography (PET) scans, spinal taps and indwelling venous catheters, from which to draw blood drug levels.  I have written him requesting a copy.  I am still waiting.

 

On May 13, 1998, F. Xavier Castellanos (NIMH) wrote to me: “…I have noted your critiques of the diagnostic validity of ADHD.  I agree that we have not yet met the burden of demonstrating the specific pathophysiology that we believe underlies this condition.  However, my colleagues and I are certainly motivated by the belief that it will be possible in the near future to do so.  Swanson thinks “we will validate it!”  Meanwhile, Castellanos and his colleagues are “… motivated by the belief that it will be possible in the near future to do so.” 

 

On August 5, 1998  William B. Carey, MD, of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, replied: “There are no such articles (constituting proof that ADHD is a disease).  There are many articles raising doubts but none that establish the proof you or I seek.”. Barkley (1998) implies that brain atrophy characterizes ADHD.  He cites MRI studies by Castellanos, the first of which showed that:  “Subjects with ADHD had a 4.7% smaller total cerebral volume”; while the second showed: “Vermal (cerebellar) volume was significantly less…with ADHD.” Not mentioned was the fact, acknowledged in the original report (Castellanos, 1996) that 93% of ADHD subjects had been on chronic stimulant therapy, and that the same treated cohort was used in the second study. No stimulant-naïve group has been shown to have brain atrophy. The brain atrophy is a function of their chronic stimulant therapy—the only physical variable.

 

What does this say about ADHD “science” and “scientists?”  NIMH, NIH Publication No. 94-3572, states:  “Brain scan images produced by positron emission tomography (PET) shows differences between an adult  with Attention Deficit  Hyperactivity  and an adult  free of the disease.”  Nowhere  in their peer-reviewed  literature do we find disavowals  of  their  claims of  “disease.”

 

To Cure the “Disease”

 

There is no physical  abnormality—not  in the brain,  not anywhere. To put an end to this incredible, iatrogenic epidemic, all mention of ADHD as “neuro-psychiatric,” “psycho-pathologic,” “neuro-biologic,” “biologically-based” or as a “disorder,” (implying disease but afraid to forthrightly say so) a “disease” or a “syndrome” must stop,  and  all mention of the children as “diseased,” “abnormal,”  or as “patients” must stop.  This has been the stuff of an immense, multi-billion dollar industry, and it is fraudulent. 

We must go back to valuing the children for what they are—innocent, needy, incomplete, loving, omnipotent—the embodiment of all of the potential of human-kind.  They need nothing more or less than our patience, love and common sense without end—not victimization by fraudulent  diagnoses and brain-damaging drugs in the name of  “medicine” and  “treatment.”  If the truth be known,  there are no legitimate medical issues here at all.

The AMA, The Council, JAMA, and ADHD

 

The AMA and Goldman (1998) authors of the Council Report are, no doubt, aware of the influence their report will have on the ADHD field in these times of continued proselytizing and incredible growth of the ADHD/Ritalin/psychotropic drug epidemic and growing doubts as to the validity of it all.  Is their mandate to represent science? Or have they sided with industry to protect the ADHD “golden goose”?  I am shocked at their avoidance of the main scientific question—the “disease”/ “no disease” question.

 

Armed only with the illusion of a disease,  no proof that a disease (ADHD) exists, or that the children are other than normal, the RECOMMENDATIONS of the AMA (1998) are:

 

1.      “The AMA encourages physicians to use standardized diagnostic criteria in making the diagnosis of ADHD, such as the American Psychiatric Association’s DSM-IV…”

 

2.      “The AMA encourages the creation and dissemination of practice guidelines for ADHD by appropriate specialty societies and their use by practicing physicians…”

 

3.      “The AMA encourages efforts by medical schools, residency programs, medical societies, and continuing medical education programs to increase physician knowledge about ADHD and its treatment.”

 

4.      “The AMA encourages the use of individualized therapeutic approaches for children diagnosed as having ADHD, which may include pharmacotherapy, psychoeducation, behavioral therapy, etc., etc.”

 

5.      “The AMA encourages physicians and medical groups to work with schools to improve teachers’ abilities to recognize ADHD and appropriately recommend that parents seek medical evaluation…”

 

6.      “The AMA reaffirms Policy 100.975, to work with the FDA and the DEA to help ensure that appropriate amounts of methylphenindate and other Schedule II drugs are available for clinically warranted patient use.”

 

 

 

Recommendations 5 and 6 are particularly reprehensible.  The former (5) further encourages the teachers of the nation to make a diagnosis leading to the prescription of controlled substances—constituting, in my opinion, the practice of medicine without a license.  The latter (6) pushes drugs of addiction, Schedule II drugs, upon a population free of any demonstrable physical abnormality.

 

Nor are the editors of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) unaware of the fundamental problem concerning ADHD—the need—still, for a forthright answer to the “disease”/ “no disease” question.  In a 1993 letter to the editor of the JAMA, I wrote:

 

Unlike definite syndromes, such as Klinefelter’s, Brown-Sequard, and Down’s, in which there is a constancy of symptoms and signs, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Revised, Third Edition allows any combination of  8 of 14 behaviors for a diagnosis of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.  Is this the validation of a syndrome, or does it redefine the term syndrome? … If attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder is not a proven syndrome, how can cause be inferred?  How can therapies be evaluated?

 

An article by AJ Zametkin (1995),  entitled Attention-deficit Disorder: Born to Be Hyperactive was published in the JAMA.  In a letter to the editor of JAMA that was rejected,  I wrote:

 

Without a statement that there has never been proof that ADHD is a syndrome, a disease, organic or biologic, the review by Zametkin is incomplete and misleading.  Under the heading “Pathophysiology” –as if there were a “pathophysiology”—he writes only, “the cause of ADHD is unknown.”…The ADHD literature reveals that there was never syndrome validation to begin with.  Is this not a fatal flaw? …Regarding ADHD, the “informed consent” should include the statement that ADHD has never been proven to be a biologic/organic syndrome/disease.

 

Upon rejection of my letter, I wrote to JAMA, Senior Editor, Margaret A. Winker, MD, September 21, 1995, stating:

 

…I would be especially disappointed  if it turns out that you do not plan to publish any correspondence asking for such clarification… JAMA would not wish to be seen as failing to disclose the status of what science there is regarding what is commonly referred to as ADHD.

 

Although I was assured that my letter was passed on to Zametkin,  I never received a reply from him. Would JAMA, the AMA, and the AMA Council on Scientific Affairs wish to be seen as failing to disclose the scientific status of ADHD?

 

I have sought, unsuccessfully, for five years to get a straightforward “Yes!” or “No!” answer to the “Is ADHD an actual disease or not?” question, from the leaders of the ADHD research establishment, including, most prominently, Peter S. Jensen, MD, of the NIMH in Rockville, MD,  and James M. Swanson, Ph.D., of the University of California, Irvine (both members of the Professional Advisory Board of Children and Adults with Attention Deficit Disorders-CHADD, as well).

 

As unthinkable as it may seem, what we are dealing with here, is nothing more or less than a for-profit, invented “disease” and a for-profit invented “epidemic,” perhaps the most successful of all time, in monetary terms.  At the same time, it has been one of the most diabolical and inhuman of all time, if not the most diabolical and inhuman.

 

Psychiatrist Walter E. Afield (1992) said it best, and most succinctly.  He testified before the Select Committee on Children, Youth, and Families, at the House of Representative,  April 28, 1992, on the psychiatric  hospital fraud of the 1980’s, as follows:

 

“…Florida is the most inept.  Texas is the most corrupt…the bad news is that this is a nationwide phenomena.  This is right here in Washington, DC.  It’s at Harvard, McLean Hospital.  It’s at the Menninger Clinic.  It’s at Johns Hopkins.  …there are abuses going on nationwide in our mental health system that are terrible.  …The DSM-III, we’re talking about everyone in this room will fit into two or three of the diagnoses…In DSM-II, homosexuality was a disease.  In III, it’s not.  In IV, there’ll be some new diseases.  Every new disease that’s defined gets a new hospital program, new admissions, a new system and a way to bilk it, and this bilking continues…”

 

The answer for one and all—the moment of candor from Swanson,  March 7, 1998, at the American Society for Adolescent Psychiatry:  “I think we will validate it,” translates to is: There is no objective test! There is no disease!  The children are normal!  Rather--they were normal!

 

 

Trampling Human Rights in the Name of Psychiatry

 

Wherever, for a single day, a child, or anyone in the life of a child, is lead to believe that that child is “brain-damaged,” “diseased,” “subnormal,”  “abnormal,” when they are not--that child has been stigmatized, harmed, and damaged.  The “damaging” begins with pencil-paper  tests—never  a biologic  proof .  The damaging is compounded when,  in addition, they are labeled “dyslexic” “dyscalculic” “learning disabled”—not one, a real disease.

 

Once Ritalin,  or any one of several  psychotropic drugs,  courses through their brain (and body) day-in and day-out, they are, for the very first time, physically, neurologically and biologically,  abnormal.  The disease they have, one that can be proven by objective means, by chemical analysis of any body fluid or tissue, is Ritalin (stimulant) Encephalopathy—not  ADHD, but Ritalin  Encephalopathy (fancy term for brain damage). 

Today in the US, millions of parents are being told by teachers, principals, counselors, special educators, psychologists, psychiatrists and physicians of all sorts, that their children cannot learn, and even, that they will not be permitted to come to school, unless they are taking Ritalin.  Frequently, it is implied that unless they do so, they are acting contrary to the best interests of their child, and that a court might see fit to limit or terminate their custody of their own child—all in the name of a “disease” that doesn’t exist!  That is a total,  one hundred  percent  fraud.

 

Just yesterday,  I spoke to a divorced father with an eleven  year old son who believes neither in ADHD or in Ritalin, and who, as a consequence, has had his share of custody sharply curtailed.  Further, the judge  threatened him with a loss of all custody rights were he to continue to obstruct “treatment” in any way.  To date, I have served as a medical expert or advisor on this issue to approximately 25 such parents, in divorce situations, with ADHD and Ritalin the pivotal, divisive issue.  In virtually every instance, family court judges have chosen to believe prevailing psychiatry propaganda, refusing to consider  that fact that ADHD does not exist.  In so doing, they become accomplices to the heinous, injurious diagnosing and drugging of normal children and to the unprecedented trampling of fundamental family and human rights cases that number in the millions.  After all,  the grieving children of divorce and all of the others are not grieving at all; they are not troubled; they have not been failed by the adults in their lives, their schools or communities—they have  a  “chemical  imbalance”,  they have ADHD.

 

The Hippocratic Oath does not permit such “practice.”  It does not permit the “treatment” of real children—of real human beings, for “diseases” that are not real diseases.  The Nuremberg Code does not permit the “treatment” of normal, disease-free children with addictive, dangerous, Schedule II drugs for profit.  It does not permit deception and the abrogation informed consent rights that is occurring today in virtually every case across the United States.  This is criminal.  It is child abuse.  Nothing about it is the legitimate practice of medicine.  It must be exposed.  Those responsible for the fraud and deception must  be exposed  and  held  accountable.

 

 

 

 

 

References

 

 

 

Afield, W. (1992). The Profits of Misery: How Inpatient Psychiatric Treatment Bilks the

 

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Barkley, R. (1998). Attention-Deficit  Hyperactivity Disorder.  Scientific American.

 

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Baughman , F. (1993). Treatment of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.

 

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http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/ADHD/ADHDAsFraud.htm

 

 

ADHD Not a Real Disease, Says Leading Neuroscientist

 

 

Alex Pietrowski, Waking Times | One of the world’s leading pediatric neuroscientists, Dr. Bruce D. Perry, M.D., Ph.D, recently stated publicly that Attention Deficit/Hyper-Activity Disorder (ADHD) is not ‘a real disease,’ and warned of the dangers of giving psycho-stimulant medications to children.

 

Speaking to the Observer, Dr. Perry noted that the disorder known as ADHD should be considered a description of a wide range of symptoms that many children and adults exhibit, most of which are factors that everyone of us displays at some point during our lives.

 

“It is best thought of as a description. If you look at how you end up with that label, it is remarkable because any one of us at any given time would fit at least a couple of those criteria,” he said.

 

Dr. Perry is a senior fellow of the ChildTrauma Academy in Houston, Texas, a highly respected member of the pediatric community, and author of several books on child psychology including, The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog: And Other Stories from a Child Psychiatrist’s Notebook–What Traumatized Children Can Teach Us About Loss, Love, and Healing, and, Born for Love: Why Empathy Is Essential–and Endangered.

 

His comments are quite refreshing at a time when diagnoses for ADHD in the UK and the US are sky-rocketing and prescriptions of stimulant medications to children are also rising rapidly, with many parents and concerned activists growing suspicious of the pharmaceutical industry’s motivations in promoting drugs to children. Ritalin, Adderall, Vyvanse and other mind-altering stimulant medications are increasingly prescribed to children between the ages of 4 and 17.

 

Dr. Perry noted that the use of medications like these may be dangerous to the overall physical and mental development of the child, remarking on studies where these medications were given to animals and were proven detrimental to health.

 

“If you give psychostimulants to animals when they are young, their rewards systems change. They require much more stimulation to get the same level of pleasure.

 

“So on a very concrete level they need to eat more food to get the same sensation of satiation. They need to do more high-risk things to get that little buzz from doing something. It is not a benign phenomenon.

 

“Taking a medication influences systems in ways we don’t always understand. I tend to be pretty cautious about this stuff, particularly when the research shows you that other interventions are equally effective and over time more effective and have none of the adverse effects. For me it’s a no-brainer.”

 

Given that the problem of ADHD is complex and the term is more of a blanket term used to describe a wide range of behavioral symptoms, it is important to consider what the root causes of many of the symptoms may be before pharmaceutical intervention should be considered. Citing potential remedies, Dr. Perry suggested an approach that focuses attention on the parents and the child’s environment, while also recommending natural remedies like Yoga, and improved diet.

 

“There are number of non-pharmacological therapies which have been pretty effective. A lot of them involve helping the adults that are around children,” he said.

 

“Part of what happens is if you have an anxious, overwhelmed parent, that is contagious. When a child is struggling, the adults around them are easily disregulated too. This negative feedback process between the frustrated teacher or parent and dis-regulated child can escalate out of control.

 

“You can teach the adults how to regulate themselves, how to have realistic expectations of the children, how to give them opportunities that are achievable and have success and coach them through the process of helping children who are struggling.

 

“There are a lot of therapeutic approaches. Some would use somato-sensory therapies like yoga, some use motor activity like drumming.

 

“All have some efficacy. If you can put together a package of those things: keep the adults more mannered, give the children achievable goals, give them opportunities to regulate themselves, then you are going to minimise a huge percentage of the problems I have seen with children who have the problem labelled as ADHD.”

 

Many people may disagree with the assertion that ADD/ADHD should not be considered a disease, however, the fact remains that the myriad symptoms that are associated with these increasingly common ‘disorders’ can often be addressed and relieved without creating an addiction and dependency on pharmaceutical medications, which disrupt the mind and body in ways that are not fully understood or even researched

 

http://themindunleashed.org/2014/10/adhd-real-disease-says-leading-neuroscientist.html

Hi Nova, where did you find this article? Also, I googled Dr. Baughman and learned that he is affiliated with an advocacy group that is funded by Scientology. Do you think he's a reliable source?

I already know this. It's not just ADHD/ADD it's all the disorders listed in the DSM. All fabricated and designed to stigmatize and control for profit.

Hi Nova, where did you find this article? Also, I googled Dr. Baughman and learned that he is affiliated with an advocacy group that is funded by Scientology. Do you think he's a reliable source?

 

Dr. Baughman is a respectable Neurologist and he might be affiliated with CCHR. This doesn't mean he and they are wrong. Mr. Baughman is a professional a physician.

Thanks for posting this Nova.

 

My son was diagnosed with ADD - when he was 14 he secretly stopped taking his meds, hiding them in the couch. He was fortunate to have no w/d.  He is 20 now - he had/has no such thing as ADD.  He had 2 dx's - one by the famous Maryland autism/spectrum organization in Baltimore.    For what that DX is worth, they may as well have told me there is no such thing as benzo withdrawal syndrome. 

 

Sadly, 3 of my son's cousins were also DX'd adhd and have spent their lifetimes on various drugs.

I personally don't believe a word of it.  My thinking today and forever hereafter, is if it isn't medically necessary to save one's life, all drugs are unsafe at every speed.  Particularly for phantom disorders.

PeacefulHope That's correct, all these disorders are a fraud. Life's problems are not medical diseases. This is a marketing campaign for profit.

https://infogalactic.com/info/Fred_Baughman

 

"Fred Baughman (born 1932[1]) is best known as an outspoken critic of psychiatry, and is reported as insisting that attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is "a fraud perpetrated by the psychiatric and pharmaceutical industries on families anxious to understand their childrens' [sic] behavior".[2] Baughman has testified before the United States Congress, and has been interviewed on PBS on the topic of ADHD. He has made several appearances on talk shows, and has written several self-published books. Baughman has also been a medical adviser for the Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR), an advocacy group established in 1969 by the Church of Scientology, noted opponents of modern psychiatry."

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"Baughman has been a medical expert for CCHR, an advocacy group established in 1969 by the Church of Scientology and psychiatrist Thomas Szasz."

I can easily think some disorders are a fraud. Designed to make money for drug companies. Fibromyalgia comes to mind immediately. There is NO way to diagnose this mysterious disorder, yet thousands of people, mostly women, are told they have it. I was, and the only darn thing wrong with me was I was on benzos. My guess is that when a physician facing a patient he cannot figure out, mainly females, they slap on the phoney diagnosis of Fibromyalgia to justify the money they will get by seeing the patient. I don't mean to sound like all doctors are liars and cheats. Some really do care, but no doctor can know every single thing. Benzos are a prime example, and I also think the drug companies have deliberately suppressed the truth about these drugs and ADS.

I am not a fan of psychiatry anymore. Shrinks have become mere pill pushers....give them the drugs and make the darn money is what has happened. Do you know a psychiatrist who sees a patient for more than perhaps 15 minutes??? Doubt it.

Once I got off benzos and ADs, I no longer was depressed, anxious, or any other sort of psych disorder except for some mild OCD'ism that started in WD off those drugs. Getting off drugs taught me to never trust a doctor again. ONLY I control my health.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30872743

 

"Association of symptoms of attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder and impulsive-aggression with severity of suicidal behavior in adult attempters.

 

Conejero I1, Jaussent I2, Lopez R3, Guillaume S2,4, Olié E2,4, Hebbache C5, Cohen RF6, Kahn JP7,6, Leboyer M5, Courtet P2,4, Lopez-Castroman J8,2.

Author information

 

Abstract

 

Literature emphasizes the relationship between attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and suicidal behavior (SB). However, the link between ADHD and the severity of SB is yet to be determined. We investigated the association between a probable diagnosis of ADHD and the severity of SB in 539 hospitalized suicide attempters, and determined the role of comorbid psychiatric diagnoses. The severity of SB was defined as the number of suicide attempts, age at first suicide attempt, seriousness and violence of suicide attempts. A diagnosis of probable adult ADHD (probable ADHD) was defined as the presence of both current ADHD symptoms and ADHD symptoms in childhood. We evaluated the combined effect of high impulsive-aggression levels and probable ADHD. Probable ADHD was not associated with early or frequent suicide attempts after adjustment for psychiatric disorders and treatment intake. High levels of impulsive-aggression increased the risk of an early suicide attempt, particularly in patients with ADHD symptoms, and independently of other clinical factors. The association between serious suicide attempts and probable ADHD remained significant after adjustment. Although ADHD is involved in suicidal vulnerability, psychiatric comorbidities and impulsive-aggression appear to largely explain the severity of SB in adult attempters with ADHD symptoms."