How does the existence of side effects in other medicines affect the status of psychiatric medicines and their percieved (in)effectiveness or their overprescription status?
You claim I'm 'demonizing' (i.e., being unfair towards) a subset of the medical profession when in fact I'm only relaying my personal experience and skepticism based on that. I don't doubt that there are a whole host of other medicines whose effictiveness is unknown and whose popularity is primarly due to its availability as free samples in doctor's offices and the U.S.'s notoriously effective prescription drug advertisement industry.
But to make that a point in this discussion seems like a misdirection more than an counter-argument. Two things can be bad at the same time independently.
To answer your questions: I dated someone with night terrors from Chantix, have a relative who is addicted to opoids (but who thinks no one knows when he's high at Christmas dinner), but have thankfully never had to deal with the last two.
Even still -- none of those latter series were prescribed to treat disorders discovered after the invention of the drug itself. This is the primary point of skepticism: horrible side effects for well-advertised drugs for disorders we just recently discovered affecting, what was astutely noted by another commentor, the most complex organ of the body.
Many psychiatric medications are an excellent example of 'when you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail.'
> How does the existence of side effects in other medicines affect the status of psychiatric medicines and their percieved (in)effectiveness or their overprescription status?
> You claim I'm 'demonizing' (i.e., being unfair towards) a subset of the medical profession when in fact I'm only relaying my personal experience and skepticism based on that. I don't doubt that there are a whole host of other medicines whose effictiveness is unknown and whose popularity is primarly due to its availability as free samples in doctor's offices and the U.S.'s notoriously effective prescription drug advertisement industry.
Because you singled out and attacked psychiatrists and psychiatry as if there were something inherent to that field of medicine and that class of medications that is not present in other fields and types. You specifically said:
>> Every other medical revolution -- such as the rise of antibiotics, the pioneering of complex surgeries, and the advancements in medical imaging -- have resulted in a net reduction of people suffering from the ailments those tools are involved in treating.
>> Not so with psychiatry. The more drugs that are developed, the more illnesses are discovered to use them on.
That is not merely relating your experience. That is throwing a particular medical specialty under the bus for what are in fact widespread issues with medical practice.
> Even still -- none of those latter series were prescribed to treat disorders discovered after the invention of the drug itself. This is the primary point of skepticism: horrible side effects for well-advertised drugs for disorders we just recently discovered affecting, what was astutely noted by another commentor, the most complex organ of the body.
Are you claiming that there were no mental disorders until the advent of psychiatric drugs? That a subset of disorders are just marketing ploys by a psychiatrist-industrial complex?
Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness
To explain further the unique situation that mental health drugs present. You might benefit especially from the notes section, to which his citations refer.
Am I saying there is a conspiracy between psychiatrists and pharmacuetical companies? Were it only so simple! There are a myriad of complex reasons why we're in the situation we're in -- but claiming that the situation is not unique, that my discussion of my personal experience and the research behind it is somehow a 'demonization' of an otherwise unremarkable industry belies both the thesis of the article and experiences of millions of patients.
> To explain further the unique situation that mental health drugs present.
...
> claiming that the situation is not unique, that my discussion of my personal experience and the research behind it is somehow a 'demonization' of an otherwise unremarkable industry belies both the thesis of the article and experiences of millions of patients
You are saying it is unique, I am saying it is not. How am I misrepresenting the thesis?
You claim I'm 'demonizing' (i.e., being unfair towards) a subset of the medical profession when in fact I'm only relaying my personal experience and skepticism based on that. I don't doubt that there are a whole host of other medicines whose effictiveness is unknown and whose popularity is primarly due to its availability as free samples in doctor's offices and the U.S.'s notoriously effective prescription drug advertisement industry.
But to make that a point in this discussion seems like a misdirection more than an counter-argument. Two things can be bad at the same time independently.
To answer your questions: I dated someone with night terrors from Chantix, have a relative who is addicted to opoids (but who thinks no one knows when he's high at Christmas dinner), but have thankfully never had to deal with the last two.
Even still -- none of those latter series were prescribed to treat disorders discovered after the invention of the drug itself. This is the primary point of skepticism: horrible side effects for well-advertised drugs for disorders we just recently discovered affecting, what was astutely noted by another commentor, the most complex organ of the body.
Many psychiatric medications are an excellent example of 'when you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail.'