Psychiatrists Say Schools Steer Parents To Over Medicate Kids
New York Times Syndicate
Judy Holland
October 02, 2000
WASHINGTON - Psychiatric leaders warned Congress Friday that too many educators are urging parents of problem children to give them prescription drugs rather than address their real problems at home or school.
Dr. Peter R. Breggin, director of the International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology, a nonprofit research group in Bethesda, Md., said school officials are pressing parents to give such children stimulant drugs such as Ritalin, Concerta, Metadate, Dexedrine and Adderall.
``Teachers, school psychologists and administrators commonly make dire threats about their inability to teach children without medicating them,'' Breggin told a panel of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce.
``They sometimes suggest that only medication can stave off a bleak future of delinquency and occupational failure.''
The psychiatrist added that ``with 53 million children enrolled in school, probably more than 5 million'' difficult youngsters are taking psychoactive drugs - stimulants intended to calm and focus them.
Since the early 1990s, he said, North America has turned to such drugs to control the behavior of problem children and the United States uses 90 percent of the world's supply of Ritalin.
He cited a recent study in Virginia showing that 20 percent of fifth-grade white boys were getting stimulant drugs during the day from school officials with the parents' consent.
In an interview later, Breggin said that in many cases, ``instead of identifying and meeting our children's education needs, we're diagnosing the behavior and drugging the children. (They) need people, not pills. They need improved relationships with parents and teachers, not drug-blunted brains.''
Some of the commonly used stimulants are highly addictive, kill brain cells, disrupt growth hormone production and can lead to depression, he warned.
Another expert, Dr. Fred A. Baughman Jr., a fellow with the American Academy of Neurology, told the House panel that teachers often ``are in a veritable diagnosing ecstasy.''
Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich., who heads the oversight subcommittee considering the psychoactive drug issue, said he plans to hold another hearing on the subject because he suspects school systems are identifying a high percentage of children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in order to get more federal funds.
Hoekstra said funds from Medicaid, the federal-state health program for the poor; Supplemental Security Income, which aids people with mental or physical disabilities, and from the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act ``may be triggering over-diagnosis.''
He added in an interview, ``I want to make sure that if we have 5 million kids on these types of drugs, they are being medicated for the right reasons.''
Rep. Bob Schaffer, R-Colo., a subcommittee member of the subcommittee, cited the case of a child who was diagnosed as ADHD but whose short-attention span stemmed from her need for eyeglasses. He said he worries that exhausted teachers are looking for an easy way to pacify problem children.
But Dr. David Fassler, chairman of the American Psychiatric Association's Committee on Children, Adolescents and Families, argued that stimulant drugs can help children who suffer from inattention, hyperactivity and impulsive behavior, if they are used along with therapy.
Fassler conceded, however, that ``some kids are being medicated who haven't been correctly diagnosed.'' The incorrect diagnoses often come from pediatricians who are not trained to deal with hyperactive children, he said.
Judy Heumann, assistant secretary for special education and rehabilitative services at the Department of Education, said the role of teachers must be informative, not diagnostic.
She said the Education Department has been saying since 1993 that decisions to prescribe drugs ``must be made by families and physicians, not by educators.''
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This news story is not produced by the American Psychological Association and does not necessarily represent the opinions of the association.