Hello MARK!
17 Jul 97 12:08, MARK PROBERT wrote to STEVEN GODBE:
 MP> You certainly do have a right to post whatever you want here.
 MP> However, do not expect it to go unchallenged. That is MY right.
 MP> As for your comment about "paranoia", this is "offensive
 MP> diagnosing" and an interesting slant on the ad hominen attack.
Mark, accusing someone you don't know of an 'agenda', or a conspiracy,
or comparing them to a third person while discussing them with a 4th
person in pseudo 'stage-whispers' is not a way to win friends or to
influence people either.  You and I've hit it off on the wrong foot
since that 1st post.  Neither you or I either one has had much to say
that was pleasant one to the other, and that's just not the way I
normally operate, so I'm stopping it on my end here and now.
That doesn't mean that I still don't hold strongly contrasting opinions
to some you've voiced here.  It doesn't mean that I don't intend to
speak my mind either.  It just means I'm going to tone myself down a
few levels and ask you to do the same, fair enough?  We might even be
able to actually discuss our points of intellectual difference rather
than fling them at one another.  Are you game?
AND, I've said all that I want to say on the subject of Dr. Dot.
No one heard the point I wanted to raise anyway, and I steadfastly
refuse to be drawn into more speculation there.
 MP> Dr. Breggin is a major red flag. He denies the existence of ADHD.
 MP> he blames parents. I have been to programs where he has done so.
I have never seen Dr. Breggin speak.  I know him by reputation and his
written words.  I've never seen a specific writing of his which outright
denies the existence of ADHD.  I HAVE seen writings very critical of
the way some laypersons, teachers, and even some doctors diagnose and
attempt to treat the symptomologies they identify as ADHD exclusively
with psychopharmaceutical treatments.
Lemme give you a fer-instance.  I have a good friend who works as a
psychologist for a school district north of Houston.  Her job for that
school district is to aggressively test the children for learning
disabilities and other disabilities like ADHD so that the children
may be certified as such and so the school district can qualify for
increased funding for that child.  A few years ago she was bragging
that they'd already managed to get ****25%**** of the children in the
district certified to be learning-impaired or disabled, and were
accellerating to get still more certifications and more funding.
This is/was a relatively wealthy school district, too, I might add.
Those children are going to be wearing labels most of their lives,
they're going to be given medications upon which there is no clear
consensus about the impact of long-term use and which it is known
will cause severe side-effects in a significant number of them even
WITH the close medical supervision only a few will get, and I find
it seriously doubtful that anywhere near 25% of them truly are
'disabled' or require stimulant medications.  I also can't believe
that the money insurance companies and the state spends upon them and
upon certifying them couldn't be better put into smaller numbers of
children per classroom and instructor, and into more customized
curricula. BUT, the emphasis, currently, is all on psychopharmacy.
Drug them, take the easier route.
 SG> MP>> He denies its existence, and is
 SG> MP>> opposed to the most effective treatment modalities.
The 42nd "Physician's Desktop Reference" has some interesting comments
about Ritalin usage.  It says it shouldn't be used in children 6 or
younger.  It also lists a truly daunting list of possible symptoms
ranging from stunting of growth and appetite suppression to producing
uncontrollable tics and Tourrette's yndrome.  It further says that
sufficient data of long-term use of Ritalin in children are not available.
That seems to me to be very valid grounds to be cautious about the current
rates of prescription to children which the United Nations International
Narcotic Control Board claims is prescribed in the use at ***more than 5
times*** the rate of any other country in the world!  It's even more
worrisome when the DEA reports how often the drug is abused and how
addictive the drug may be.
Elsewhere on the web, I read that Dr. Peter Jensen of the National
Institute of Mental Health outright admitted that "it  is
being innappropriately prescribed ".  I read that a
New Jersey court *ORDERED* a child be treated with Ritalin or not be
allowed to participate in a state-funded education in New Hampshire.
That doesn't sound particularly American or prudent either one.
 MP> No, his problem is that it is diagnosed at all. He has flatly
 MP> claimed that it does not exist.
As I've said, I've not read that.  I have read others written opinions
that state that attention span may well be like native intellectual
capacity, achievable in dramatically different capacities in different
persons because of the genes.  If that is the case, drugging is
certainly a solution, but so are different instruction methodologies
and environments.  It's a valid argument warranting further exploration
and study, not an attack upon parents.
 SG>> that too frequently when it is, there's often an over-reliance
 SG>> upon drug treatment to the exclusion of all others, that often
 SG>> children are over-medicated both in dose and with
 SG>> poly-pharmacy, and he feels it's a crime that these
 SG>> medications have been prescribed so heavily to adolescents and
 SG>> children when there's little research having been done on the
 SG>> effects of long- term use on the brain, and NO research having
 SG>> been done upon the effects upon the GROWING brain.
 MP> This, of course is an interesting argument. Invalid, but
 MP> interesting.
There ya go, just because you personally disagree with with an
argument doesn't mean it's invalid.  Your lack of concern about the
long-term implications of poly-pharmacy and psychoactive medications,
particularly in children, is completely out of step with many voices
being raised in the medical community.
 MP> Methylphenidate has been around for four decades. People and
 MP> children have been taking it for very long periods of time. There
 MP> has been no reported long term effects other than mild growth
 MP> retardation that can be addressed by a change in eating habits.
That is simply not true, Mark.  If you've researched as much as you
claim, you know damn well this is a gross over-simplification of the
specific concerns listed in even the Physician's Desktop Reference.
Would you like me to type the entry in for you?
In other places, physicians are reporting results of studies which
show:
        after five years of use, children who received drugs did not
        differ significantly from those who did not.
        weight was not predictive of proper dose of Ritalin.
        MPH generic medical preparations may be from 10%-30% less
        effective than brand-name Ritalin in use.
 MP> No, I discount his work vis-a-vis ADHD. I have not concerned
 MP> myself with the rest of what he does. It has no bearing on my
 MP> life, or that of my ADHD child. I have said nothing to indicate
 MP> otherwise.
I'm sorry then, I interpretted much of what you'd written about him
to be broad-brushed dismissals of the man's work.  That would be
inappropriate, and according to you, it wasn't what you meant anyway?
Steven
--- GoldED/2 2.42.G0214
(1:106/1393)
---------------