The " Fuller Torrey" Treatment Advocacy Center lobbying to limit civil rights and force drug large segments of our population

The " Fuller Torrey" Treatment Advocacy Center lobbying to limit civil rights and force drug large segments of our population

I happened to come across this article on The Mental Health Minute blog in my web browsing. Upon reading this article I had the sneaking suspicion there was some unsavory anti-civil rights group behind the article.

So I looked a little deeper to find this was right out of the infamous "Fuller Torrey's" Treatment Advocacy Center that promotes laws for forced medication throughout America. So with the help of "MsPiggy" in the comment section the conversation has begun.

I invite others to go over and join in the fun conversing with D.J. JAFFE co-founder of the Treatment Advocacy Center. This is kind of strange actually, since the Treatment Advocacy Center does not allow comments and dissenting opinions on their site.

D.J. Jaffe appears to be either pimping out/drumming up support by commenting and posting articles on this site; or this site is just a nice little front to sneak their naughty propaganda message out to unsuspecting readers, while focus on nursing bodies for support. Either way, TAC's message is both wrong and dangerous.

Update:

I have been keeping watch upon The Mental Health Minute since posting this piece. It appears the vast majority of the content on this site is very much in lock step with TAC's fear mongering campaign related to those labeled with mental health issues.

Let me clarify the facts and evidence here for everyone reading: those deemed with mental health labels are no more likely to commit violent crimes than any other segment of our society and population.

TAC's positions and efforts are based on untruth, and rely upon manipulation of fear based propaganda to sway public opinion and influence government representative bodies for the removal of civil rights and constitutional principles from a unjustly targeted group of innocent individuals.

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Let’s make Kendra’s Law permanent

I knew nothing of the Kendra’s Law until reading this article. After reading it, though, I did have one of those “ah-ha!” moments and found myself wondering why this idea has taken so long to show up. I love the idea of keeping people in their own communities whenever possible. According to this article, with court mandated treatment added to the mix, it seems it is possible.

Unfortunately, the mental health patient is the type of patient who usually will not be compliant with treatment and will quit at any opportunity–quit therapy, quit medications, quit follow-up appointments. It’s possible that all of this involves way too much and is overwhelming or disturbing, or maybe the patient believes he is cured and no longer needs help. Whatever the reason, I like the idea of some type of court order to remain on medication and therapy as a condition to remaining at home in the community.

I know that there are those who will feel that this is controlling and harsh. For those who feel that way, I can say I understand your concerns. However, my experience with the mentally ill shows me that being mentally ill is not comfortable and does not feel safe to the person. If getting medication routinely can remove the fear and the emotional pain, I believe it is the right thing to do. Granted, this article is talking about dangerously ill and aggressive people who are untreated, so in the interest of social norms and safety I also have to agree with this idea to medicate as a condition of remaining out in the population.

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By D.J. JAFFE
First published: Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Eleven years ago, state government leaders were shocked into action by the death of Kendra Webdale. She was suddenly and intentionally pushed to her death in front of an oncoming New York City subway train by a man with schizophrenia whom the state Office of Mental Health had let go untreated.Shortly thereafter, Edgar Rivera was also pushed in front of a train by another mentally ill man whom the Office of Mental Health had let go untreated. Mr. Rivera survived, but lost his legs.

To help avoid a repeat, the state legislative leadership put politics aside and passed Kendra’s Law in August 1999. But the law sunsets this year. If the Legislature doesn’t make it permanent, 1,800 patients with mental illness — many of them with a history of violence — could become free to go off their medications.

Kendra’s Law allows the courts to commit a small group of potentially violent mentally ill individuals to accept treatment as a condition for living in the community. Equally important, it commits the Office of Mental Health to providing that treatment.

Kendra’s Law has proved to keep the public safer and patients healthier. It saves money by cutting down on hospitalization rates, length of hospitalizations, inpatient commitment rates and incarceration.

But if some state-funded providers of mental health services have their way, the law will die in June. That would be dangerous.

A 2005 Office of Mental Health study compared how seriously mentally ill people did for six months before they participated in the Kendra’s Law program and for six months while they participated. It found that while participating, 47 percent fewer harmed others, 46 percent fewer damaged or destroyed property, 83 percent fewer were arrested and 87 percent fewer were incarcerated.

A 2009 Duke University School of Medicine study showed the law has had a positive effect on the mental health system and the patients in it. The law allows patients to stay in the community — a less restrictive, less expensive, more humane setting than the alternative: inpatient commitment.

So why would anyone oppose making permanent a law that helps patients, keeps the public safer and saves money?

Making Kendra’s Law permanent does have support from groups as diverse as the National Alliance on Mental Illness and the New York State Association of Chiefs of Police. But, according to testimony in 2005 by the National Alliance on Mental Illness- New York State, “There is a movement to stop the law led by … a consortium of mental health rehab organizations…. These organizations do skills acquisition, not symptom management. To benefit from their programs, one must be stable and have insight into one’s illness.”

And therein lies the rub. These programs fear losing their ability to pick and choose easier to treat, more compliant, less ill people to participate in their programs.

Office of Mental Health Commissioner Michael Hogan is on record as favoring Kendra’s Law.

Yet, for some inexplicable reason, he has cut down on the number of people entering the program and increased the rate at which they leave. That helps neither the mentally ill nor the communities in which they live.

In 2005, the Legislature chose to renew the law, rather than make it permanent, to appease the anti-treatment advocates and to address their concerns with new studies. But the results are now in: The law works.

More studies cost money and divert resources. Not knowing whether the law will expire prevents programs that do help the seriously mentally ill from investing in the infrastructure to make it work.

Renewing the law, rather than making it permanent, will only give providers more time to develop more faux concerns and waste more government money proving what everyone knows: Treatment works.

This law should not be held hostage to those who want to kill it. Kendra Webdale died. Kendra’s Law shouldn’t. The Legislature should make it permanent now.

D.J. Jaffe is an advocate for the seriously mentally ill and a co-founder of the Treatment Advocacy Center (http://www/kendraslaw.org). His e-mail address is djjaffe@treatmentadvocacycenter.org.Thank you for posting this. You can read my op-ed in Albany Times Union at http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=896401&category=OPINION and a new study on it’s success at

http://www.healthcanal.com/mental-health-behavior/5834.html

I am TheRealMrMe on Twitter
We encourage individuals to learn more at kendraslaw.org and we are looking for orgs to sign up as endorsers. (Non NYS residents visits treatmentadvocacycenter.org)

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D.J. Jaffe said:

I see you are a psychiatric nurse. If you have contacts at the National or NYS Association of Psychiatric nurses, we would love to have their support.

Following are just a few of the many articles demonstrating the violence to Nurses who work in psychiatric units that we believe could be reduced through enactment of Kendra’s Law:
American Psychiatric Nurses Association 2008 Position Statement on Workplace Violence
http://www.apna.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=3786

Psychiatric Services Article on Violence and aggression in psychiatric units

http://psychservices.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/49/11/1452

Contemporary Nursing Article on Violence against Psychiatric Nurses

http://www.contemporarynurse.com/archives/vol/21/issue/1/article/681/violence-against-psychiatric-nurses

http://www.nursingcenter.com/library/JournalArticle.asp?Article_ID=692114

You can sign up to be listed as a supporter of Kendra’s Law and get inside updates at kendraslaw.org

Independent studies in NYS show Kendra’s Law was a huge success:

• 74 percent fewer experienced homelessness;
• 77 percent fewer experienced psychiatric hospitalization;
• 83 percent fewer experienced arrest; and
• 87 percent fewer experienced incarceration.
• 55 percent fewer recipients engaged in suicide attempts or physical harm to self;
• 49 percent fewer abused alcohol;
• 48 percent fewer abused drugs;
• 47 percent fewer physically harmed others;
• 46 percent fewer damaged or destroyed property; and
• 43 percent fewer threatened physical harm to others.

The law sunsets in 2010 which would mean several thousand mentally ill people who are required to stay on meds would be freed to go off them. We want the law made permanent and funded in light of the success above. It’s a more humane way to treat patients and is safer for the public.

We would like to list as many state and local Nurse organizations as possible as supporters. When we release the list it will include numerous major advocates for the mentally ill, professional organizations, and public safety groups.
Please sign up to be listed as a supporter of Kendra’s Law and get inside updates at kendraslaw.org

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MsPiggy said:

For your assumption that the mentally ill must be required to take their medications to earn their constitutional and human rights; wouldn’t you first want to prove the medications and similar treatments are not doing more harm, than good.

I’m always amazed how those that believe they are qualified to make one size fits all choices and laws that make themselves feel somehow superior or safer from the supposed/targeted lesser than people.

If you have worked in this field as long as you claim; then you would know first hand that it’s a poorly constructed revolving door debacle at best. If the drugs we use really worked as effectively as claimed(and you know that’s pretty much all the vast majority will get in a locked environment), we would not have the rampant re-hospitalization rates, a deteriorating mentally ill population with a life span some twenty years less than average, and an emerging epidemic of mental health related problems taking strangle hold upon our society.

Of course who would dare question the ghost written and questionable science, those god doctor key opinion leaders, NAMI (aka drug company marketing reps), and those global influential giants in pharmaceutical corporate profit heaven.

In fact many of the medications being forced upon patients today may actually cause psychosis and related mental health problems on top of an already very challenged constitutional make up or environmental situation. Not to mention the tremendous risk/cost in psychically debilitating side effects from these drugs.

So I gather in your opinion, psychiatrist and mental health professionals know better and should be given the power to circumvent a persons judicial rights.

If you had cancer, would you be in favor of forced treatment with a drug cocktail you believed was harmful.If you were overweight, would you want to be forced into a perhaps dangerous diet of someone Else’s choosing, as just a couple examples of where the “forced medication/treatment modality leads and has gone a rye into true insanity.

Being a mental health professional or medical professional does not qualify anyone to choose a person’s course of treatment against their will, their expressed wishes, or the choice not to be treated at all.

When did a few years in school, an MD, RN, and some hospital experience make anyone qualified to make those decisions for others (this is why INFORMED CONSENT was created). Why don’t you take a few of these magical medications and get back to us on how well your doing in let’s say a year or five?

I have also put much time in working professionally with the whole gambit of mental health populations, and see this problem in an entirely different light. Obviously not everyone is walking in lock step to these intrusions upon a patients very humanity.

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D.J. Jaffe said:

If you have questions about the law (vs. me) I would be glad to answer them. Kendra’s Law specifically prohibits medication over objection and instead, relies on prior law which requires a finding of lack of capacity.

Kendra’s specifically requires doctors to consider the postive and negative side-effects and to solicit consumer input in developing any treatment plan.

As far as your attack on me, I led opposition to how Sandoz marketed clozapine and how respiridol was being marketed when NAMI was sitting on sidelines approving of it. You can search the Wall St. Journal or NY Times if you want.

Also, for whatever it’s worth, I do have cancer (leukemia) and am on a med: zoloft. I also am willing to accept responsibility for what I say by using my real name.
When you are willing to do the same, let’s talk.

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MsPiggy Said:

DJ Jaffe, You are directly out Fuller Torrey’s “Treatment Advocacy Center” correct. So I take it you are in sync with Torrey’s cat matter virus theory causing mental illness, and with his claim that Haldol is an anti viral drug. You also do know that Fuller Torrey holds the patent for the under the skin long acting Haldol disc.

You also do realize Torrey has admitted in public speaking engagements to being completely delusional and having no science to back up his claims. Just maybe you have read some of articles at “Furious Seasons” blog related to your organization and Fuller Torrey.

I can tell you this much in fact about your group, it has nothing to do with Patient Advocacy.

I certainly hope your not saying Zoloft is a treatment for cancer here?

In closing I was not attacking personally, but stating a difference of opinion responding to the article, to your comments, and to your organizations efforts.

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MsPiggy Said:

By the way it’s really hard to take your prior comments about NAMI seriously since you were on their board hiding the huge amounts of money being funneled in by Pharma. DJ JAffe:

Board Member
Treatment Advocacy Center
(Marketing and Advertising industry)
1997 — 2009 (12 years )

Board Member
National Alliance for the Mentally Ill
(Marketing and Advertising industry)
1984 — 1999 (15 years )

2/3 of NAMI funding came directly from the Pharmaceutical Industry, while NAMI promoted/lobbied public policy and laws that would benefit the pharmaceutical industry. Would you like to disclose all finanacial connections between Pharma and TAC for me here?

Would you like to comment on the connections between the (TAC and Fuller Torrey ran) Stanley Foundation’s financial connection to Harvard’s Dr. J. Biederman’s in his Risperdal trials on children, the tainted results, the unethical protocol violations in the research, and all the conflicts of interest under Senate investigation across the board?

Being the TAC spokesperson, I’m quite sure you would like to respond and explain these and other questions.

I will not even ask about F. Torrey’s procured brain collection and the scandal behind it.

UPDATE:

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Mark PS said:

re”Unfortunately, the mental health patient is the type of patient who usually will not be compliant with treatment”

First you must identify voluntary and involuntary patient.
If he/she is voluntary, he/she is indeed a patient.
If he/she in not voluntary, he/she is a prisoner not a patient. There are no physical test for mental illness.

“Treatment” is a change in behaviour that authority needs-wants, not a cure of a disease such as a virus or bacterial infection.

The free will of person is their choice to do good or evil.
If a person can not control their actions like a person with epilepsy, they should not be in public. But most everyone has this ability. The action of pushing someone onto train tracks is a criminal action due to its complexity- coordinated action. It is not a medical one.

With freedom we all have the choice to perform evil or good actions, even myself an unmedicated “schizophrenic”.

Only when a crime has occured can “we” jail and “treat” people.
Medicating people for life is the same as jailing them for life. If medicated for life, I hope the patients proven crime justifies that “medical treatment”.

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Stephany said:

Challenging Society’s perception of violence and people labeled with mental illness labels:

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/10/challenging-society-perception-mental.html

From the General Archives of Psychiatry

“Because severe mental illness did not independently predict future violent behavior, these findings challenge perceptions that mental illness is a leading cause of violence in the general population. Still, people with mental illness did report violence more often, largely because they showed other factors associated with violence. Consequently, understanding the link between violent acts and mental disorder requires consideration of its association with other variables such as substance abuse, environmental stressors, and history of violence.”

Stanley Medical Research Institute, Joseph Biederman, Fuller Torrey and TAC

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/03/stanley-medical-research-institute.html

Superior Court of New Jersey
In re: Risperdal/Seroquel/Zyprexa
Litigation

Video Deposition of Joseph Biederman, MD
Friday February 27, 2009
Boston, MA.

page 342

Q. What is the Stanley Medical Research Institute?

A.(Biederman) The Stanley family has a foundation that is called now the Stanley Medical Institute that funded us for a few years to conduct the psychopharmacological research on pediatric bipolar illness.

Q. How many studies has the Stanley Medical Research Institute funded of yours?

A. They funded a center, so there was a group of studies, studies that involved neuroleptics and studies that followed up, but mostly a study that involved treatment.

Q. What center did they fund?

A. They funded the center for the treatment of pediatric mania, so we conducted studies examining Zyprexa, Seroquel, Risperdal(risperidone).We did a study of preschoolers, these type of things.

Q. So the center for Pediatric Mania has been funded exclusively by the Stanley Research Medical Institute?

A. (Biederman)Yes.It’s the center for treatment of pediatric mania.That’s probably correct.

Comment by Stephany | March 1, 2010 | Reply

TAC/Treatment Advocacy Center, Fuller Torrey, Stanley Foundation

Stanley Foundation Brain Harvesting Illegal in Washington State.

“2005 article of interest:

“Virginia Hendricks can’t help but feel betrayed. Just a few days after her son Jim died unexpectedly, the King County Medical Examiner’s office called, asking to take a sample of her son’s brain. Instead, without permission, the county sent Jim’s entire brain, plus his mental health and medical history files to the Stanley Medical Institute in Bethesda Maryland.”

“The sister of a homeless, mentally ill man named Bradley Gierlich is suing King County as well. In a lawsuit filed late Friday, the family claims nobody ever gave permission to harvest organs. Bradley Gierlich’s brain was sent to Stanley medical by King County anyway.”

(link to that article in my previous comment)

TAC is nothing but a fear mongering association directly attempting to forcibly drug innocent people based on their personal stats, which always promote stories of violence, yet these are rare events in society, and it all is directly tied to pharmaceuticals, and the fact that Jaffe came to this blog to ask for a nurses association to follow suit, appears like a pharma rep in a doctor’s office, shady and self-serving.

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Comments are welcome as usual policy

Wall Street Journal takes a swipe at the DSM-V and American Psychiatry

Wall Street Journal takes swipe at DSM-V and Psychiatry

I came across this interesting article in the Wall Street Journal I thought worth highlighting here for you. Though, I do not believe it's goes far enough in it's depth of questioning; kind of missing out on the huge force and influence the pharmaceutical industry has upon psychiatry's misdeeds and greed. Once you get past all the DSM-V in fighting, ego spats, and ridiculous mumble jumbo; it's really the money that drives this horrendously damaging modality and a false subjective so called science.

If hoarding makes it through into this latest voodoo DSM manual; then Big Pharma, Psychiatry, and now all of modern medicine appear to be suffering from untreatable cases of extreme hoarding and greed mongering. There are definitely not enough drugs on this planet to treat that kind of progressive rampant disease. Only total annihilation will suffice as the ultimate intervention in their particular cases and circumstances.

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WSJ -Why Psychiatry Needs Therapy<---- I suggest you follow the link to read the complete article

Why Psychiatry Needs Therapy

A manual's draft reflects how diagnoses have grown foggier, drugs more ineffective

By EDWARD SHORTER

To flip through the latest draft of the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, in the works for seven years now, is to see the discipline's floundering writ large. Psychiatry seems to have lost its way in a forest of poorly verified diagnoses and ineffectual medications. Patients who seek psychiatric help today for mood disorders stand a good chance of being diagnosed with a disease that doesn't exist and treated with a medication little more effective than a placebo.

Where is psychiatry headed? What the discipline badly needs is close attention to patients and their individual symptoms, in order to carve out the real diseases from the vast pool of symptoms that DSM keeps reshuffling into different "disorders." This kind of careful attention to what patients actually have is called "psychopathology," and its absence distinguishes American psychiatry from the European tradition. With DSM-V, American psychiatry is headed in exactly the opposite direction: defining ever-widening circles of the population as mentally ill with vague and undifferentiated diagnoses and treating them with powerful drugs.

Senator Grassley to FDA - Stop putting Big Pharma First. Start doing your job protecting the people of America from dangerous drugs

Senator Grassley to FDA - Stop putting Big Pharma First. Start doing your job protecting the people of America from dangerous drugs

Avandia, Seroquel, Vioxx, Phen Phen, and the deadly list just goes on and on. The FDA has once again shown everyone they are a deeply corrupted and completely incompetent government agency that does not serve the best interest of citizens. I know this is the same old news by now @ the FDA; but as the human toll and body count continues to rise, you have to wonder OUT LOUD when we will as a people finally say enough is enough.




hat tip to pharmagossip for bringing this video to my attention

Anatomy of an Epidemic - blowing the lid off a false modality steeped in criminal greed and corruption

Anatomy of an Epidemic - blowing the lid off a false modality steeped in criminal greed and corruption

Every once in a great while comes along something that shines the brilliant light of truth upon a horrific and shameful crime being propagated upon our civilization and all of humanity. Robert Whitaker has written such a book in "Anatomy of an Epidemic".

Decades from now, people will look back upon the crimes of this age and ask why? Why were these evil criminals masking themselves in the thin false vale of science and medicine able to propagate such horrific crimes against humanity? Why they were not hanged in the public squares, thrown into dark dungeons to rot in moral humiliation of everlasting turpitude, and openly ridiculed into complete oblivion? How did we as a people and a society allow this to happen to even our most vulnerable, including our children?

Though the book will not be officially released until April, I thought I would do a rare plug on this site in advance of its release.

Read just a few critiques from others related to this book:

“Lucid, pointed and important, Anatomy of an Epidemic should be required reading for anyone considering extended use of psychiatric medicine. Whitaker is at the height of his powers.”—Greg Critser, author of Generation Rx

“Every so often a book comes along that exposes a vast deceit. Robert Whitaker has written that sort of book. Drawing on a prodigious quantity of psychiatric literature as well as heart-rending stories of individual patients, he exposes a deeply disturbing fraud perpetrated by the drug industry and much of modern psychiatry—at horrendous human and financial cost to patients, their families, and society as a whole. Scrupulously reported and written in compelling but unemotional style, this book shreds the myth woven around today’s psychiatric drugs.” —Nils Bruzelius, former science editor for the Boston Globe and the Washington Post

“A devastating critique. . . . One day, we will look back at the way we think about and treat mental illness and wonder if we were all mad. Anatomy of an Epidemic should be required reading for both patients and physicians.” —Shannon Brownlee, senior research fellow, New America Foundation and author of Overtreated

“Why are so many more people disabled by mental illness than ever before? Why are those so diagnosed dying 10-25 years earlier than others? In Anatomy of an Epidemic investigative reporter Robert Whitaker cuts through flawed science, greed and outright lies to reveal that the drugs hailed as the cure for mental disorders instead worsen them over the long term. But Whitaker’s investigation also offers hope for the future: solid science backs nature’s way of healing our mental ills through time and human relationships. Whitaker tenderly interviews children and adults who bear witness to the ravages of mental illness, and testify to their newly found “aliveness” when freed from the prison of mind-numbing drugs.”—Daniel Dorman, M.D., Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, UCLA School of Medicine and author of Dante’s Cure: A Journey Out of Madness

“This is the most alarming book I’ve read in years. The approach is neither polemical nor ideologically slanted. Relying on medical evidence and historical documentation, Whitaker builds his case like a prosecuting attorney.”—Carl Elliott, M.D., Ph.D., Professor, Center for Bioethics, University of Minnesota and author of Better than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream

“Anatomy of an Epidemic investigates a profoundly troubling question: do psychiatric medications increase the likelihood that people taking them, far from being helped, are more likely to become chronically ill? In making a compelling case that our current psychotropic drugs are causing as much—if not more—harm than good, Robert Whitaker reviews the scientific literature thoroughly, demonstrating how much of the evidence is on his side. There is nothing unorthodox here—this case is solid and evidence-backed. If psychiatry wants to retain its credibility with the public, it will now have to engage with the scientific argument at the core of this cogently and elegantly written book.”—David Healy, M.D., Professor of Psychiatry, Cardiff University and author of The Antidepressant Era and Let Them Eat Prozac

“Anatomy of an Epidemic is a splendidly informed, wonderfully readable corrective to the conventional wisdom about the biological bases—and biological cures—for mental illness. This is itself a wise and necessary book—essential reading for all those who have experienced, or care for those who have experienced, mental illness—which means all of us! Robert Whitaker is a reliable, sensible, and persuasive, guide to the paradoxes and complexities of what we know about mental illness, and what we might be able to do to lessen the suffering it brings.”—Jay Neugeboren, author of Imagining Robert and Transforming Madness

“Every so often a book comes along that exposes a vast deceit. Robert Whitaker has written that sort of book. Drawing on a prodigious quantity of psychiatric literature as well as heart-rending stories of individual patients, he exposes a deeply disturbing fraud perpetrated by the drug industry and much of modern psychiatry—at horrendous human and financial cost to patients, their families, and society as a whole. Scrupulously reported and written in compelling but unemotional style, this book shreds the myth woven around today’s psychiatric drugs.” —Nils Bruzelius, former science editor for the Boston Globe and the Washington Post

“A devastating critique. . . . One day, we will look back at the way we think about and treat mental illness and wonder if we were all mad. Anatomy of an Epidemic should be required reading for both patients and physicians.” —Shannon Brownlee, senior research fellow, New America Foundation and author of Overtreated

Sunday Seattle Times Front Page - government fear mongering over the state of insanity

Sunday Seattle Times Front Page - government fear mongering over the state of insanity

"BRAVE NEW WORLD"

Yes, those Big Pharma, Nanny State progressives, the NAMI drug pimps/lobbyist, and those quackery Fuller Torrey loving demons are at it again in Washington State. This one has "Big Brother" written all over it. If you have the possible potential to break any law or they believe/suspect you MIGHT or MAYBE dangerous; government wants the power to lock you up as being insane, and then force drug you into total compliance without you ever committing a single crime or violation of the law.

Those pesky obstacles like the constitution, civil rights, due process, and evidence won't stand in "Nanny States" way. So now the legislature and governor in Washington State are passing new laws to make it easier to commit just about anyone based on the word of your angry neighbors, your ex, that co-worker you pissed off, someone who doesn't like your politically views, or some twisted psychiatrist or mental health professional you just told to "GFY".

Forget about due process folks, a brave new world is being cast upon us.

Links to the bills:

3076-S2.pdf
2882-S2.pdf

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Read the entire article here --->seattletimes

Bills would make it easier to force mentally ill into care

Legislation before a state Senate committee would make it easier to commit and treat potentially dangerous mentally ill people under the controversial Involuntary Treatment Act.

The state House of Representatives has passed two bills — both by unanimous votes —

The legislation would make it easier to detain dangerous mentally ill people under the state's controversial Involuntary Treatment Act by broadening the criteria for holding them against their will. One key revision: The current threshold, which requires that they pose an "imminent likelihood" of harm to self or others, would be lowered to a "substantial" likelihood of harm.

The measures would modify other definitions and also specify that those making the commitment decision may consider information offered by family members, co-workers and others.

While some worry the changes could make a current shortage of psychiatric beds even worse and might prove very costly, others celebrated the proposals.

The modifications may seem insubstantial, but they represent a "sea change" in attitudes by lawmakers, said Eleanor Owen, executive director of the Seattle chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI).

"Trust me, if we in fact implement those 'minor' changes, we will see a reversal of the number of people who end up with criminal records," Owen said.

Over the years, family members have complained that the high bar for commitment under the 1970s-era law has made it nearly impossible to get early help for a mentally ill and potentially violent relative.

"You have to have a gun to your head or your mother's head" to be held, Owen said.

The Involuntary Treatment Act was passed in the early '70s after civil libertarians complained that mentally ill people were being locked up and treated against their will — even when they weren't considered dangerous — sometimes because family members or others found their behavior upsetting.

The law's creators argued that taking away a person's liberty was extremely serious and should be done only under the strictest standards, and courts have agreed.

Over the years, though, family members of mentally ill people and some mental-health experts have complained that the law erred on the side of civil liberties while shortchanging public safety and clinical knowledge about mental illness.

While the law effectively protects a person's civil liberties, said Dr. Peter Roy-Byrne, chief of psychiatry at Harborview Medical Center, "I don't think it protects your right to be treated."

Dr. Cristos Dagadakis, medical director of the crisis-intervention service at Harborview Community Mental Health Services, praised the proposed revisions.

"I've been advocating it for two decades," he said. "I think this is an opportunity to get people into care quicker."

The two bills containing the proposals are now in the Senate Human Services & Corrections Committee, where a hearing on one is scheduled for Thursday.

Lawmakers, prosecutors and others have long struggled with the best way to balance civil liberties while getting dangerous mentally ill offenders off the streets.

Rep. Mary Lou Dickerson, D-Seattle, a sponsor of the bills, said Harps' murder shows that "mental-health professionals do not have adequate tools" to use in deciding when to commit someone for treatment.

"It is my hope that by intervening early we can actually save these individuals from having to go into the criminal-justice system, where so many of them end up."

The issue of involuntary treatment and commitment is perhaps "the most divisive and controversial topic" within the mental-health community, a consultant reported to the state in early 2007.

So it comes as no surprise that there's not universal support for the proposed changes — particularly in light of a long-standing shortage of local psychiatric beds in King and other counties.

Early intervention is good, said Amnon Shoenfeld, director of mental health, chemical abuse and dependency services for King County, but "changing the law with the specific intent of detaining more people will make a bad situation worse."

"We don't have enough capacity to detain the people we're already detaining," Shoenfeld said.

Who decides

Those who evaluate people with mental illness for possible commitment are called "designated mental-health professionals."

Most have a master's degree in social work, while others are psychiatric nurses or psychologists. King County has 28.

In deciding how much risk a person poses to himself or the community, they investigate circumstances, often talking with police, relatives and neighbors. In emergency situations, they alone can decide to hold someone for 72 hours.

Deliberately independent of both the legal and medical systems, they must understand the complexities of mental illness as well as the provisions of the law, said Shoenfeld, because ultimately, committing a person against his will is a legal process.

In King County, 2,365 mentally ill people were committed under the law in 2009, Shoenfeld said. The majority went to Navos in West Seattle, a psychiatric hospital, or to Harborview.

About one-quarter had to be "boarded" in an emergency room or other place, waiting an average of two days for a psychiatric bed.

Washington ranks at or near the bottom of states in number of local psychiatric beds per 100,000 population, experts say. But because earlier treatment might help stabilize people more quickly, beds may open up sooner, Dagadakis said. "Nobody really knows how things will play out."

In any case, not having enough beds should not preclude changing the law, said Roy-Byrne at Harborview.

Gov. Chris Gregoire had asked for a more comprehensive revision of the commitment law, but supports the measures passed by the House.

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Some interesting comments from readers:


cake walk said:


Government walks all over the constitution and human rights once more.

So they purpose to lesson the threshold to hold someone (incarcerate) and force drug (with unproven and dangerous substances) because they MIGHT act a certain way.

Here we go again down a very slippery slope. Once you lesson the rights toward one segment of society, the rights of everyone are placed at severe risk.

Next, we can get those nasty park spitter's, those under taxed health nuisance smokers, maybe go after those crazy pot users, or gun toting whack jobs, even the homeless, and anyone which might present such potential dangers to society.

Which ever political or philosophical leaning you may have or employ, the list of targets are endless from both sides of the isle.

Do we lock away anyone that has the potential to be high risk for any crime? Do we target the poor and foster children because some flawed statistical analysis determines they have a higher propensity for mental health problems and crime.

Of Coarse NAMI toots this horn, it's a gold mind for the Drug Company's that control and run their little dog and pony show.

The real facts are unmistakable, we can not handle or provide meaningful, effective, or humane treatment to those we have forced into this horribly broken system now ( just check out the poor track records and revolving door policies at Western State Hospital and DSHS).

So now Olympia in it's infinite wisdom, responding to one forensic mishap (the escape of one forensic individual from Eastern State Hospital on an outing) wants to may political pay dirt of every person that "MAY" or "Might Possibly" have the Potential to pose a threat to society.

This sounds a whole lot like their budget fixes; TAX, TAX, and then TAX some more; instead of looking at thier vast over spending, while always shucking their innate responsibility.

Only this time around "Nanny State" wants to play politics and remove constitutional rights from a significantly under served and fragile population of human lives.

Let's call out "BULLSHIT", and stop the real madness where it actually resides - with politicians in Olympia



TP said:

Thomas Gergen's sad story underscores what has becoem the norm; rather than commit someone, simply prescribe some medication - which they may not take - and send them on their way.

While nobody wants to see the state go back to the days of involuntary lobotomy - think Francis Farmer - there's got to be a compromise. One that will ensure the safety of those who are acquaitances, friends or loved ones of someone with a mental illness.

Continuing to spout platitudes about the Constitution does nothing to address this. Mental illness wasn't understood when the Founding Fathers wrote and signed that document. Consider how the mentally ill were treated at that time. Do we really want to go back to the days of aslyums?




cake walk said:

Terry Parkhurst - says in retort "spout platitudes about the Constitution"

OK, why don't you go and spend let's say the next three weeks incarcerated at Western State Hospital or even Navo's County Mental Health Facility (court ordered stays of six months and beyond for those that have committed no crime are common, before being dumped to the street with little or no follow up care and housing). Great solution!

Remember refusing drugs in not an option if you ever wish to taste freedom again. In fact you'll have to earn to right to fresh air. you have no coffee, you have no soda, and you definitely have no cigarettes allowed (they have determined those commonly used items are bad for your mental health. I would like to see the science and study behind those denial of rights).

I believe it would be healthy for you to experience those Staff Jailers and the Lesser Patient curve predicament and power vacuum that "those supposed dangerous people" are placed under.

Then come back here and share your thoughts on the constitution and human rights with us please.

I have read a whole lot of fear mongering and fingering pointing in this comment section and in the article itself. I could easily cherry pick a few instances in any behavioral category to support removal of rights from one population verses another; but is it fair?

Yet, with all the new and improved treatments employed by Big Pharma, and pimped out by NAMI Types ( right out of the quack "Fuller Torrey" mold). We do not see the results in stabilized disorders, persons, societal function, or even less diagnosis among this targeted population.

In reality according to resent APA views, as much as 50% (or more) of the population suffer from a treatable mental health condition. So 50% of the population may very well fit into the new lowered criteria for forced outside intervention.

"Do we really want to go back to the days of asylums?"

We already have unfortunately; forced treatment is after all forced treatment no matter how you wish to paint it.

Let's us all remember that tyrannical governments of the past usually started their crimes against humanity by singling out the most vulnerable populations first.
Before the concentration camps were inflicting mass genocide, those institutionalized in facilities for the mentally deranged and developmentally disabled were the first victims to fall prey to these atrocities.

Yes your right "Terry Parkhurst and the like minded: We better not mention human rights, the Constitution, or even peer into the lenses of History when passing laws to make it easier to remove freedoms and liberties from a targeted population.

After all, fear, power, and money rules the day



Nil said:

We could have more money for real health issues if we used our performance audits for more than witch-hunting. As is, we spend too much money on high paid administration that is nothing more than a drain of resources and produces neither a safer or more efficient system for patients or taxpayers. However, no one in Olympia will look there to save money. This is why with DSHS and education the budget is bloated to the bursting point.



Get real said:

With our budget in $2.8 B I L L I O N in debt whose going to pay for all this?

I thought we had locked up all the crazys.. in the State Legislature building?
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Fid over at SEROXAT SUFFERERS - STAND UP AND BE COUNTED posted this interesting video, that I thought I would re-post here since Pharma and those they fund are targeting our children with their soulless corporate greed mongering.

Joseph Andrew Stack - suicide manifesto - terrorism, insanity, or revolution?

Joseph Andrew Stack - suicide manifesto - terrorism, insanity, or revolution?


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"If you’re reading this, you’re no doubt asking yourself, “Why did this have to happen?” The simple truth is that it is complicated and has been coming for a long time. The writing process, started many months ago, was intended to be therapy in the face of the looming realization that there isn’t enough therapy in the world that can fix what is really broken. Needless to say, this rant could fill volumes with example after example if I would let it. I find the process of writing it frustrating, tedious, and probably pointless… especially given my gross inability to gracefully articulate my thoughts in light of the storm raging in my head. Exactly what is therapeutic about that I’m not sure, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

We are all taught as children that without laws there would be no society, only anarchy. Sadly, starting at early ages we in this country have been brainwashed to believe that, in return for our dedication and service, our government stands for justice for all. We are further brainwashed to believe that there is freedom in this place, and that we should be ready to lay our lives down for the noble principals represented by its founding fathers. Remember? One of these was “no taxation without representation”. I have spent the total years of my adulthood unlearning that crap from only a few years of my childhood. These days anyone who really stands up for that principal is promptly labeled a “crackpot”, traitor and worse.

While very few working people would say they haven’t had their fair share of taxes (as can I), in my lifetime I can say with a great degree of certainty that there has never been a politician cast a vote on any matter with the likes of me or my interests in mind. Nor, for that matter, are they the least bit interested in me or anything I have to say.

Why is it that a handful of thugs and plunderers can commit unthinkable atrocities (and in the case of the GM executives, for scores of years) and when it’s time for their gravy train to crash under the weight of their gluttony and overwhelming stupidity, the force of the full federal government has no difficulty coming to their aid within days if not hours? Yet at the same time, the joke we call the American medical system, including the drug and insurance companies, are murdering tens of thousands of people a year and stealing from the corpses and victims they cripple, and this country’s leaders don’t see this as important as bailing out a few of their vile, rich cronies. Yet, the political “representatives” (thieves, liars, and self-serving scumbags is far more accurate) have endless time to sit around for year after year and debate the state of the “terrible health care problem”. It’s clear they see no crisis as long as the dead people don’t get in the way of their corporate profits rolling in.

And justice? You’ve got to be kidding!

How can any rational individual explain that white elephant conundrum in the middle of our tax system and, indeed, our entire legal system? Here we have a system that is, by far, too complicated for the brightest of the master scholars to understand. Yet, it mercilessly “holds accountable” its victims, claiming that they’re responsible for fully complying with laws not even the experts understand. The law “requires” a signature on the bottom of a tax filing; yet no one can say truthfully that they understand what they are signing; if that’s not “duress” than what is. If this is not the measure of a totalitarian regime, nothing is.

How did I get here?

My introduction to the real American nightmare starts back in the early ‘80s. Unfortunately after more than 16 years of school, somewhere along the line I picked up the absurd, pompous notion that I could read and understand plain English. Some friends introduced me to a group of people who were having ‘tax code’ readings and discussions. In particular, zeroed in on a section relating to the wonderful “exemptions” that make institutions like the vulgar, corrupt Catholic Church so incredibly wealthy. We carefully studied the law (with the help of some of the “best”, high-paid, experienced tax lawyers in the business), and then began to do exactly what the “big boys” were doing (except that we weren’t steeling from our congregation or lying to the government about our massive profits in the name of God). We took a great deal of care to make it all visible, following all of the rules, exactly the way the law said it was to be done.

The intent of this exercise and our efforts was to bring about a much-needed re-evaluation of the laws that allow the monsters of organized religion to make such a mockery of people who earn an honest living. However, this is where I learned that there are two “interpretations” for every law; one for the very rich, and one for the rest of us… Oh, and the monsters are the very ones making and enforcing the laws; the inquisition is still alive and well today in this country.

That little lesson in patriotism cost me $40,000+, 10 years of my life, and set my retirement plans back to 0. It made me realize for the first time that I live in a country with an ideology that is based on a total and complete lie. It also made me realize, not only how naive I had been, but also the incredible stupidity of the American public; that they buy, hook, line, and sinker, the crap about their “freedom”… and that they continue to do so with eyes closed in the face of overwhelming evidence and all that keeps happening in front of them.

Before even having to make a shaky recovery from the sting of the first lesson on what justice really means in this country (around 1984 after making my way through engineering school and still another five years of “paying my dues”), I felt I finally had to take a chance of launching my dream of becoming an independent engineer.

On the subjects of engineers and dreams of independence, I should digress somewhat to say that I’m sure that I inherited the fascination for creative problem solving from my father. I realized this at a very young age.

The significance of independence, however, came much later during my early years of college; at the age of 18 or 19 when I was living on my own as student in an apartment in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. My neighbor was an elderly retired woman (80+ seemed ancient to me at that age) who was the widowed wife of a retired steel worker. Her husband had worked all his life in the steel mills of central Pennsylvania with promises from big business and the union that, for his 30 years of service, he would have a pension and medical care to look forward to in his retirement. Instead he was one of the thousands who got nothing because the incompetent mill management and corrupt union (not to mention the government) raided their pension funds and stole their retirement. All she had was social security to live on.

In retrospect, the situation was laughable because here I was living on peanut butter and bread (or Ritz crackers when I could afford to splurge) for months at a time. When I got to know this poor figure and heard her story I felt worse for her plight than for my own (I, after all, I thought I had everything to in front of me). I was genuinely appalled at one point, as we exchanged stories and commiserated with each other over our situations, when she in her grandmotherly fashion tried to convince me that I would be “healthier” eating cat food (like her) rather than trying to get all my substance from peanut butter and bread. I couldn’t quite go there, but the impression was made. I decided that I didn’t trust big business to take care of me, and that I would take responsibility for my own future and myself.

Return to the early ‘80s, and here I was off to a terrifying start as a ‘wet-behind-the-ears’ contract software engineer... and two years later, thanks to the fine backroom, midnight effort by the sleazy executives of Arthur Andersen (the very same folks who later brought us Enron and other such calamities) and an equally sleazy New York Senator (Patrick Moynihan), we saw the passage of 1986 tax reform act with its section 1706.

For you who are unfamiliar, here is the core text of the IRS Section 1706, defining the treatment of workers (such as contract engineers) for tax purposes. Visit this link for a conference committee report (http://www.synergistech.com/1706.shtml#ConferenceCommitteeReport) regarding the intended interpretation of Section 1706 and the relevant parts of Section 530, as amended. For information on how these laws affect technical services workers and their clients, read our discussion here (http://www.synergistech.com/ic-taxlaw.shtml).

SEC. 1706. TREATMENT OF CERTAIN TECHNICAL PERSONNEL.

(a) IN GENERAL - Section 530 of the Revenue Act of 1978 is amended by adding at the end thereof the following new subsection:

(d) EXCEPTION. - This section shall not apply in the case of an individual who pursuant to an arrangement between the taxpayer and another person, provides services for such other person as an engineer, designer, drafter, computer programmer, systems analyst, or other similarly skilled worker engaged in a similar line of work.

(b) EFFECTIVE DATE. - The amendment made by this section shall apply to remuneration paid and services rendered after December 31, 1986.

Note:

· "another person" is the client in the traditional job-shop relationship.

· "taxpayer" is the recruiter, broker, agency, or job shop.

· "individual", "employee", or "worker" is you.

Admittedly, you need to read the treatment to understand what it is saying but it’s not very complicated. The bottom line is that they may as well have put my name right in the text of section (d). Moreover, they could only have been more blunt if they would have came out and directly declared me a criminal and non-citizen slave. Twenty years later, I still can’t believe my eyes.

During 1987, I spent close to $5000 of my ‘pocket change’, and at least 1000 hours of my time writing, printing, and mailing to any senator, congressman, governor, or slug that might listen; none did, and they universally treated me as if I was wasting their time. I spent countless hours on the L.A. freeways driving to meetings and any and all of the disorganized professional groups who were attempting to mount a campaign against this atrocity. This, only to discover that our efforts were being easily derailed by a few moles from the brokers who were just beginning to enjoy the windfall from the new declaration of their “freedom”. Oh, and don’t forget, for all of the time I was spending on this, I was loosing income that I couldn’t bill clients.

After months of struggling it had clearly gotten to be a futile exercise. The best we could get for all of our trouble is a pronouncement from an IRS mouthpiece that they weren’t going to enforce that provision (read harass engineers and scientists). This immediately proved to be a lie, and the mere existence of the regulation began to have its impact on my bottom line; this, of course, was the intended effect.

Again, rewind my retirement plans back to 0 and shift them into idle. If I had any sense, I clearly should have left abandoned engineering and never looked back.

Instead I got busy working 100-hour workweeks. Then came the L.A. depression of the early 1990s. Our leaders decided that they didn’t need the all of those extra Air Force bases they had in Southern California, so they were closed; just like that. The result was economic devastation in the region that rivaled the widely publicized Texas S&L fiasco. However, because the government caused it, no one gave a shit about all of the young families who lost their homes or street after street of boarded up houses abandoned to the wealthy loan companies who received government funds to “shore up” their windfall. Again, I lost my retirement.

Years later, after weathering a divorce and the constant struggle trying to build some momentum with my business, I find myself once again beginning to finally pick up some speed. Then came the .COM bust and the 911 nightmare. Our leaders decided that all aircraft were grounded for what seemed like an eternity; and long after that, ‘special’ facilities like San Francisco were on security alert for months. This made access to my customers prohibitively expensive. Ironically, after what they had done the Government came to the aid of the airlines with billions of our tax dollars … as usual they left me to rot and die while they bailed out their rich, incompetent cronies WITH MY MONEY! After these events, there went my business but not quite yet all of my retirement and savings.

By this time, I’m thinking that it might be good for a change. Bye to California, I’ll try Austin for a while. So I moved, only to find out that this is a place with a highly inflated sense of self-importance and where damn little real engineering work is done. I’ve never experienced such a hard time finding work. The rates are 1/3 of what I was earning before the crash, because pay rates here are fixed by the three or four large companies in the area who are in collusion to drive down prices and wages… and this happens because the justice department is all on the take and doesn’t give a fuck about serving anyone or anything but themselves and their rich buddies.

To survive, I was forced to cannibalize my savings and retirement, the last of which was a small IRA. This came in a year with mammoth expenses and not a single dollar of income. I filed no return that year thinking that because I didn’t have any income there was no need. The sleazy government decided that they disagreed. But they didn’t notify me in time for me to launch a legal objection so when I attempted to get a protest filed with the court I was told I was no longer entitled to due process because the time to file ran out. Bend over for another $10,000 helping of justice.

So now we come to the present. After my experience with the CPA world, following the business crash I swore that I’d never enter another accountant’s office again. But here I am with a new marriage and a boatload of undocumented income, not to mention an expensive new business asset, a piano, which I had no idea how to handle. After considerable thought I decided that it would be irresponsible NOT to get professional help; a very big mistake.

When we received the forms back I was very optimistic that they were in order. I had taken all of the years information to Bill Ross, and he came back with results very similar to what I was expecting. Except that he had neglected to include the contents of Sheryl’s unreported income; $12,700 worth of it. To make matters worse, Ross knew all along this was missing and I didn’t have a clue until he pointed it out in the middle of the audit. By that time it had become brutally evident that he was representing himself and not me.

This left me stuck in the middle of this disaster trying to defend transactions that have no relationship to anything tax-related (at least the tax-related transactions were poorly documented). Things I never knew anything about and things my wife had no clue would ever matter to anyone. The end result is… well, just look around.

I remember reading about the stock market crash before the “great” depression and how there were wealthy bankers and businessmen jumping out of windows when they realized they screwed up and lost everything. Isn’t it ironic how far we’ve come in 60 years in this country that they now know how to fix that little economic problem; they just steal from the middle class (who doesn’t have any say in it, elections are a joke) to cover their asses and it’s “business-as-usual”. Now when the wealthy fuck up, the poor get to die for the mistakes… isn’t that a clever, tidy solution.

As government agencies go, the FAA is often justifiably referred to as a tombstone agency, though they are hardly alone. The recent presidential puppet GW Bush and his cronies in their eight years certainly reinforced for all of us that this criticism rings equally true for all of the government. Nothing changes unless there is a body count (unless it is in the interest of the wealthy sows at the government trough). In a government full of hypocrites from top to bottom, life is as cheap as their lies and their self-serving laws.

I know I’m hardly the first one to decide I have had all I can stand. It has always been a myth that people have stopped dying for their freedom in this country, and it isn’t limited to the blacks, and poor immigrants. I know there have been countless before me and there are sure to be as many after. But I also know that by not adding my body to the count, I insure nothing will change. I choose to not keep looking over my shoulder at “big brother” while he strips my carcass, I choose not to ignore what is going on all around me, I choose not to pretend that business as usual won’t continue; I have just had enough.

I can only hope that the numbers quickly get too big to be white washed and ignored that the American zombies wake up and revolt; it will take nothing less. I would only hope that by striking a nerve that stimulates the inevitable double standard, knee-jerk government reaction that results in more stupid draconian restrictions people wake up and begin to see the pompous political thugs and their mindless minions for what they are. Sadly, though I spent my entire life trying to believe it wasn’t so, but violence not only is the answer, it is the only answer. The cruel joke is that the really big chunks of shit at the top have known this all along and have been laughing, at and using this awareness against, fools like me all along.

I saw it written once that the definition of insanity is repeating the same process over and over and expecting the outcome to suddenly be different. I am finally ready to stop this insanity. Well, Mr. Big Brother IRS man, let’s try something different; take my pound of flesh and sleep well.

The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.

The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed.

Joe Stack (1956-2010)"

02/18/2010

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Some lively commentary is going on around the nation at many blogs and news outlets.

I posted one of many comments from the Seattle Times report below:

_____________________________________________________
cakewalk:

"Unfortunately, whether you believe this was tragic act of a subhuman, terrorist, criminal, or something else entirely; there are always limits to what "some" people are willing to endure.

This fellow obviously decided he would a send a clear painful and tragic message to his end demise.

Now this is only in my personal opinion, and I don't happen to agree with his end actions ( which tragically and horribly effected some of the vary innocent people he espoused to be taking action for).
Yet, with that stated, and upon looking over his manifesto, it does not read like a deranged subhuman terrorist. http://embeddedart.com/

Though I'm not in anyway condoning this violent and tragic act. Does this honestly really surprise anyone today?

I'm quite sure the British news and government of those times called the "revolution" an act of terrorism; perpetrated by unhinged and unpatriotic criminal elements after all.

I'm quite sure I will take some commentary heat for writing this comment; and may even have homeland security busting down my door; if that is the cost of free speech, so be it."
__________________________________________________

The strong opinions are many and varied; but with government at pretty much every critical level of representation horribly failing the vast majority of people; these kinds of actions neither surprise nor shock me in the least. Maybe government should wake up and smell the tea floating in the harbor?

Note: The FBI took down the original site where this manifesto was posted by J. Stack, and reports from Homeland Security and the White House have stated this was not a "terrorist" act.

OK, then what was it exactly? The beginning of a new people's REVOLUTION

"As always your well thought out, and civilly expressed comments are welcome"

The 2010 preemption/promotion tour band wagon begins for "Alice in Pharma-land" The DSM-V Story

The 2010 preemption/promotion tour band wagon begins for "Alice in Pharma-land" The DSM-V Story

Yes, those devious and evil greedy clowns in Modern Psychiatry are already on the promotion tour to make sure “You” get a diagnosis and are expensively treated for whatever they happen to make up in the APA’s new fantasy adventure “Alice in Pharmaland” DSM-V “the pre-sequel”.

There is really only one practical and rational change that really needs to be made to the DSM manual (Besides using it for tinder/kindling at a campfire marsh mellow roast) that could make a marked improvement in usability/believability, that has mounting heaps of hard scientific evidence, and also makes undeniable/logical sense; that the sociopath and psychopath criteria/diagnosis needs to be revamped to include Psychiatry and those practicing its voodoo medicine in this latest addition.

I won’t go into my favorite and most recommended treatment options for this despicable incurable illness in this particular post, so not to skew the DSM-5 committee’s pristine unbiased Pharma funded/tainted scholastic process.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

off the AP news wires and @ seattletimes

Doctors may alter psychiatric diagnoses

The American Psychiatric Association is proposing major changes Wednesday to its diagnostic bible, the manual that doctors, insurers and scientists use in deciding what's officially a mental disorder and what symptoms to treat.

By LAURAN NEERGAARD

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON — Don't say "mental retardation" — the new term is "intellectual disability." No more diagnoses of Asperger's syndrome — call it a mild version of autism instead. And while "behavioral addictions" will be new to doctors' dictionaries, "Internet addiction" didn't make the cut.

The American Psychiatric Association (APA) is proposing major changes Wednesday to its diagnostic bible, the manual that doctors, insurers and scientists use in deciding what's officially a mental disorder and what symptoms to treat. In a new twist, it is seeking feedback via the Internet from both psychiatrists and the general public about whether the changes will be helpful before finalizing them.

The manual suggests some new diagnoses. So far, gambling is the lone identified behavioral addiction, but in the new category of learning disabilities are problems with both reading and math. Also new is binge eating, distinct from bulimia because the binge eaters don't purge.

Sure to generate debate, the draft also proposes diagnosing people as being at high risk of developing some serious mental disorders — such as dementia or schizophrenia — based on early symptoms, even though there's no way to know who will worsen into full-blown illness. It's a category the psychiatrist group's own leaders say must be used with caution because scientists don't yet have treatments to lower that risk but also don't want to miss people on the cusp of needing care.

Another change: The draft sets scales to estimate both adults and teens most at risk of suicide, stressing that suicide occurs with numerous mental illnesses, not just depression.

But overall the manual's biggest changes eliminate diagnoses that it contends are essentially subtypes of broader illnesses — and urge doctors to concentrate more on the severity of their patients' symptoms.

The psychiatric group expects that overarching change could actually lower the numbers of people thought to suffer from mental disorders.

"Is someone really a patient, or just meets some criteria like trouble sleeping?" said APA President Dr. Alan Schatzberg, a Stanford University psychiatry professor. "It's really important for us as a field to try not to over diagnose."

The update of this manual called the DSM-5 — the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fifth edition — is the first update since 1994, and brain research during that time period has soared.

That work is key to give scientists new insight into mental disorders with underlying causes that often are a mystery and that cannot be diagnosed with, say, a blood test or X-ray.

The draft manual, posted at www.DSM5.org, is up for public debate through April.

Comment made @ Seattle Times on this article:

If you were able to read this article and have not become nauseous, irritated, or questioned where the real madness actually resides; you are probably almost maybe showing the beginning serious signs of an undetectable made up major mental illness.

Please rush in to see your doctor, where you will get placed on very expensive mind altering medications that can behaviorally control your normality and quash any lingering remnant fragments of common sense for goodness sake.

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The following article comes right out of the dangerous and crippling Dr. Biederman “Boy Boobs” and “We must aggressively treat children with poison anti-psychotics before any illness presents itself, this isn’t therapeutic Tushy Massage after all damn it”.

The Notorious Dr. Biederman camp @ Harvard, CABF, and Big Pharma keeps coming up with this new way to package an old/new made up disease with the Big bucks conflict of interest gravy train and Key Opinion leaders propaganda written all over it once more.

“Where have all the Flowers gone, long time passing. When will we ever learn, when will we ever learn”

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From NPR News

Children Labeled 'Bipolar' May Get A New Diagnosis

by Alix Spiegel

February 10, 2010

Since the mid-1990s, the number of children diagnosed with bipolar disorder has increased a staggering 4,000 percent. And that number has caused a lot of controversy in the world of child psychiatry.

Doctors faced with kids struggling with explosive moods felt the diagnosis was appropriate and said that the bipolar medications they gave to children worked. Research psychiatrists worried that the children were being given a label that wasn't right for them, and saddled with the sentence of a serious mental illness for the rest of their lives.

In a move that could potentially change mental health practice all over America, the American Psychiatric Association has announced that it intends to include a new diagnosis in its upcoming fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual — and hopes that new label will be used by clinicians instead of the bipolar label. The condition will be called temper dysregulation disorder, and it will be seen as a brain or biological dysfunction, but not as a necessarily lifelong condition like bipolar.

Reworking The Book Of Mental Disorders

When clinicians see a patient with mental health issues, part of their job is to determine if the patient is experiencing temporary emotional struggles or if the patient has an illness. To do this, doctors rely on the bible of psychiatry, a book called the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. The DSM lists all the mental disorders recognized by the American Psychiatric Association.

The book is also used by insurance companies to decide which treatments they'll pay for, and by courts to help determine insanity or other mental conditions.

The APA is releasing a new draft of the DSM Wednesday, the first major revision since 1994. This latest version of the book, the DSM-V, proposes some significant changes to the following disorders:

The DSM is the official dictionary of mental disorders recognized by the American Psychiatric Association. Doctors use the DSM to diagnose patients, and insurance companies use it to decide on reimbursement, so it's incredibly important in the profession of psychiatry.

By adding this new entry, the American Psychiatric Association is trying to use the considerable institutional power of the DSM to curb use of the pediatric bipolar label.

But it will take some time to determine whether psychiatrists and psychologists will actually change their ways. "I don't know what they'll do," said Dr. David Shaffer, one of the psychiatrists on the DSM-V childhood committee that is behind this change. "Maybe the practitioners will be such firm believers in it that they'll continue to use [bipolar]. But, you know, I guess there are a lot of people that have been involved in reviewing this."

The Beginning Of 'Bipolar' Children

The notion that children might suffer from bipolar disorder in large numbers is new, dating back only to the mid-1990s.

Dr. Janet Wozniak, an assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, was one of the people who first popularized this idea.

Wozniak says that when she was starting out, most psychiatrists placed the prevalence of bipolar disorder in children somewhere between "never" and "vanishingly rare."

"Papers about bipolar disorder in children would usually start out with the phrase, 'Here's a disorder that's so rare maybe you'll see one or two in your entire lifetime in practice,' " Wozniak says.

Wozniak herself only started thinking about pediatric bipolar disorder when she got a job as a researcher in the clinic of a famous Harvard child psychiatrist named Dr. Joseph Biederman. Biederman was studying kids with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and felt that there was a portion of the kids in his clinic whose problems with anger seemed to go way beyond normal ADHD. So he asked Wozniak to look into it.

She did. And what she found were kids who continued to struggle with intense, uncontrollable outbursts of anger — violent hitting and screaming and kicking — even after they passed through the preschool years.

She felt these outbursts were substantively different from the kind of outbursts you saw among ADHD kids, who often had problems regulating their impulses. Then one day, she says she had an insight.

"This child that I was thinking of as having really difficult-to-treat ADHD and a lot of parent-child interaction problems, I really was ignoring the serious mood component of their problem." In other words, it wasn't that the kids just had problems with their impulse control; there was a more serious problem of mood. These kids were bipolar.

Redefining A Defining Characteristic

Wozniak wrote all this up in a now famous paper proposing that some of the kids characterized as having ADHD were actually bipolar.

The paper won awards. Clinicians began to approach Wozniak at meetings saying her insights made intuitive sense. She had helped transformed their practice.

But Shaffer says that to see these children as bipolar, Wozniak and her co-author, Joseph Biederman, had to change one critical component of the traditional definition of bipolar disorder. "The defining feature of manic-depression was that it was episodic," says Shaffer. "You had episodes of depression and episodes of mania and episodes of normal mood, and that was really, its defining characteristic."

But the kids Wozniak described rarely, if ever, had these kind of discrete weeklong or month-long episodes. So to make them fit the traditional concept of bipolar disorder, Shaffer says, she and Biederman made the argument that in children, episodes presented themselves in a radically different way.

"They said maybe in childhood the episodes would be very brief and very frequent," says Shaffer. "These are called 'ultra diem,' you know, 'many times a day.' If you regarded every time children changed their mood, every time they lost their temper or became overexcited, as a mood episode, then they were really being misdiagnosed and were really cases of bipolar disorder."

Critics countered that bipolar should look the same in kids and adults, that there wasn't good evidence that these kids grew up to be bipolar, and that if you looked backward at bipolar adults, they didn't necessarily have these uncontrolled anger issues when they were young, Shaffer says.

Nevertheless, pediatric bipolar disorder took off. Today, it's estimated that at least 1 million children in the United States have been diagnosed with the disease. Wozniak is convinced that she knows why. "The diagnosis took off because it made clinical sense," she says. "Because we opened our eyes."

A Second Look At Bipolar Diagnoses

Gabrielle Carlson, a child psychiatrist at Stony Brook University, doesn't agree that the bipolar label took off simply because the diagnosis allowed clinicians to finally categorize children in a way that made sense. She points to a host of other reasons.

For example, she says many of the kids now categorized as bipolar were, once upon a time, diagnosed as having conduct disorder. Kids with conduct disorder are seen as very combative, aggressive, and prone to destructive behavior. But the treatments for conduct disorder are woefully limited, says Carlson. "Mostly prayer and fasting," she says. "We don't have good treatments for it. We've got parent-training kinds of treatment, very strict behavioral modification kinds of things, but the evidence that therapy makes a big difference is not wonderful."

Which is why when every day psychiatrists were told that they could now think of this set behaviors as manic-depression, not as conduct disorder, they got so excited, says Carlson. "They thought, 'Heck, if that's what it is, we have a bunch of medicines that are supposed to be helpful for mania — maybe I can make it better,' " she says. This has deep appeal to doctors face to face with parents who are heartbroken over the difficult time their child is having.

Another advantage to the bipolar label, Carlson points out, is that the insurance industry saw bipolar as a biological or medical problem, while conduct disorder was seen more as a parenting problem, so insurance companies were reluctant to reimburse for it.

"If you've got something that says it's not a medical problem," says Carlson, insurance is not going to pay for it. "Conduct disorder is bad parenting, lousy environment, poor supervision, you're a bad seed. It ain't a medical problem. Bipolar they'll pay for."

Finally, Carlson argues, parents themselves were relieved on some level. Because this set of behaviors was no longer seen as conduct disorder, the psychiatrist sitting across the desk from them was no longer blaming them for the terrible things that were happening to their child.

"Part of the acceptance of the bipolar if you're a parent is, 'Hey I'm off the hook on this one. It's not 'cause I'm a bad parent, I've just got this kid with a genetic problem. It's not my fault,' " says Carlson. "You know, there's some pros and cons to that, but the fact remains many people found that liberating."

A Lifelong Label

So clearly there are some real advantages to using the bipolar label. The problem, says Carlson, is that because bipolar disorder is understood as a chronic lifelong problem, you really want to be very careful about how you apply it.

"If you have a child who's got this behavior but you're not sure how it's going to evolve, to say to somebody, 'You've got to be on this medication for the rest of your life' is sentencing someone to something that's premature. And in the case of some of these medications, where we're not sure of some of the metabolic side effects; you may be exposing them to a risk that they don't need to have."

In fact, the problems with medication was foremost in the mind of the people put in charge of the childhood disorder section of the manual, says Shaffer. Particularly, Shaffer says, atypical, anti-psychotic medications, which, he says, "we think have quite profound effects on important mechanisms on the brain that may influence growth and development of the nervous system."

So, Shaffer and his DSM colleagues set out to create a new diagnosis — temper dysregulation disorder — that they hope clinicians will use instead of the bipolar label, he says. "We were trying to find a way to adequately describe the really quite serious behaviors that many of the children who've been given [the bipolar label] have. So what we thought would be valuable would be to carve out a group with the most severe reactions: [children] who when they do lose their temper, do so with great force, and who are having [tantrums] frequently — two or three times a week — and between the big episodes, have an abnormal mood."

Getting The Diagnosis Right

Of course there is no way to predict what practical effects creating the TDD category might have. For instance, Carlson points out that even if they are successful at changing the label that clinicians use, it could be that the kids all get the same medications as before. "They may get many of the same. Absolutely," she says. "But the difference is going to be that you won't have to take this for the rest of your life."

Carlson doesn't necessarily see this as a bad thing. She emphasizes that these children have very serious problems, and though there's been trouble naming it, there's clearly some sort of dysfunction in their brain. Shaffer agrees. "I don't think anyone is arguing that these are perfectly normal children that get the label [bipolar] — far from it," he says. "We're saying these kids are very sick. But they probably don't have bipolar disorder. And they probably do deserve a name that adequately describes what they're doing."

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One pill makes you larger
And one pill makes you small
And the ones that mother gives you
Don't do anything at all
Go ask Alice
When she's ten feet tall

Further reading @ soulful sepulcher

Pediatric Bipolar Disorder & DSM-5 : "Temper Dysregulation Disorder"