Children and Medication

As most of you know, I am pretty firmly in the no medication camp when it comes to treating children. I will concede that in rare cases medication is necessary but those cases are very very rare. What I see most of the time is medication being used to treat behavioral issues and those are almost always treatable through the application of behavioral techniques that have been proven to work thousands of times. As far as medication goes, I am most unnerved by the blindness with which we subject our children to what are, in effect, uncontrolled clinical trials. Zyprexa, which has been shown to have some devastating side effects in adults is going to be used in children. Check out the first video to see a report on that. The second is probably much more controversial but it's my belief you are laregly only getting the drug companies talking points from the press so a little dose of 'alternate programming' is a good thing. As always, I advise parents to discuss all medical issues with their doctor but remember that your doctor MIGHT NOT KNOW. Most doctors receive most of their 'education' on drugs from drug company representatives. My goal is always to help inform the debate, not yell fire and run from the room...

adam