ADHD Drug Marketing Ploy

A Patient on ADD ADHD Drugs and Anovulation: Case Study

by Jeffrey Dach MD

Nancy is recently married at the age of 24 and she would like to start a family.

Nancy came to see me in the office because she has not had a normal menstrual period in a year.  A health professional friend of the family familiar with my work suggested she see me to restart her menstrual cycles with natural progesterone.

After a brief chat in the office, Nancy reveals she takes ADHD medication, a drug called Adderal which she started in school for a diagnosis of Attention Deficit Disorder.  Last year, her doctors switched her to a stronger dosage of Vyvanse, another amphetamine like drug commonly used for ADD/ ADHD.  She also takes a  Xanax for sleep.  After completing the routine physical examination and laboratory studies, I explained to Nancy that the ADD drugs are causing hypothalamic dysfunction, and are the cause for her anovulation and cessation of normal menstrual cycles.

I advised Nancy to taper off the ADD drugs if she wanted to resume normal ovulatory cycles.  Nancy did not at all like this message, and replied that her other doctors told her she needs to be on these drugs “for life” and besides, she needs them to function normally though her day.  Nancy stormed out of the office and did not return calls.

Attention Deficit Disorder Exposed as Drug Marketing Ploy

Article in the New York Times

For decades, now, the diagnosis and treatment of Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD ADHD) has been criticized as a marketing ploy to sell dangerous and addictive Amphetamine drugs such as Ritalln, Adderal and Vyvanse to vulnerable children.

Reform psychiatrist Peter Breggin MD (2) and Pediatric Neurologist Fred Baughman (4) have written books, given lectures and devoted their careers to fighting the “ADHD Psychiatric Enterprise”.

They both point out that “Attention Deficit Disorder” is not a medical disease. It is a fabricated diagnosis made from a checklist of classroom behaviors such as fidgeting in the seat, not paying attention to the teacher, or blurting out answers, etc. all of which they consider to be normal childhood behavior.  As such the diagnosis and treatment of ADD, ADHD  is a fraud.

Dr Breggin and Baughman  oppose the use of ADHD drugs in children, claiming the drugs convert spontaneous, creative and  inquisitive behavior into pacified, blunted and stereotyped behavior.  They quote animal studies in which amphetamines cause permanent irreversible brain damage, and studies in humans show no increase in academic performance or any other lasting benefit.

Above left image is book cover courtesy of  The ADHD Fraud: How Psychiatry Makes “Patients” of Normal Children by Fred Baughman MD (9)

New York Times Gets On Board

Finally after decades of this,  a courageous journalist, Alan Schwarz comes out in the New York Times with an article exposing the ADD, ADHD fraud.(1)

Here is a quote from the New York TImes article:(1)

“recent data …show that the diagnosis (of ADD) had been made in 15 percent of high school-age children, and that the number of children on medication for the disorder had soared to 3.5 million from 600,000 in 1990. He (Keith Connors)  questioned the rising rates of diagnosis and called them “a national disaster of dangerous proportions.”

“The numbers make it look like an epidemic. Well, it’s not. It’s preposterous,” Dr. Conners, a psychologist and professor emeritus at Duke University, said in a subsequent interview. “This is a concoction to justify the giving out of medication at unprecedented and unjustifiable levels.(1)”

Eliminate Food Additives, Artificial Preservatives, Colors and Flavorings -  the Feingold Diet and ADHD 

Soda Pop vending machines were removed from a school in Appleton Wisconsin which changed their school lunches over to the Feingold Diet, eliminating artificial food dyes, colorings, preservatives, and flavorings.  Teachers and Parents were astonished to find improved behavior in the children who were previously out of control.   Volumes of published studies reveal the link between Artificial Food Additives in the Diet, hyperactivity, neurotoxicity and ADHD type behavior problems all of which resolves upon cleaning up the diet.  Dr Bateman published a controlled trial in 2004 showing the adverse effect of artificial food colouring and benzoate preservatives on the behaviour of 3 year old children.

Left image courtesy of Feingold web site. Girl with blue tongue from Blue 1 Food Coloring.The two colors Brilliant Blue and Patent Blue were found to be mitochondrial toxins.

Mandatory Prison Sentence for Pharmaceutical CEO’s for Fraud

The marketing of the ADD/ADHD epidemic is a fraud on the public which should be halted immediately.

Last year,  five drug companies paid 5.5 billion dollars to settle US Dept of Justice allegations of fraud.   Monetary settlements are merely considered the cost of doing business, and so far, have not served as a deterrent . It’s time to take off the gloves, and impose prison sentences on pharmaceutical CEO’s and executives.   Drug Company marketing of dangerous drugs to children based on fabricated diagnoses should be punishable as felony with mandatory prison time for CEOs.

ADHD Does Not Exist, the book.

Update March 17 2014:  Article in Time Magazine: Doctor: ADHD Does Not Exist by Dr. Richard Saul (new book see below)

Link to book on Amazon: ADHD Does Not Existby Dr. Richard Saul.

Excerpt from book in the New Republic

Dr. Richard Saul is a neurologist in Northbrook, Illinois. He is affiliated with multiple hospitals in the area, including Alexian Brothers Medical Center and Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. He received his medical degree from Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science and has been in practice for 49 years. He is the author of : “ADHD Doesn’t Exist.”

MTHFR and ADHD

A mutation called MTHFR has been associated with ADD ADHD.(15-17)  This mutation causes an inability to convert folate to methyl folate, the active form of the vitamin.  Methyl folate is necessary for neurotransmitter production in the brain, and is involved in methylation reactions. MTHFR mutation testing is available and routinely done on our lab panel.   There is no methyl folate in amphetamine drugs such as Ritalin, Vyvance, Adderal.  How many children are inappropriately given amphetamine drugs for ADD, ADHD and never tested for MTHFR ? All of them.  In reality, the correct treatment is not with addictive neurostimulants.  The correct treatment is methyl-folate along with a balanced B vitamin Complex, all found at the local health food store

See my previous article on  MTHFR -folate in autism.

Article with related interest: 

Modern Medicine, Organized Crime and Peter Gotzsche

Defrocking the False Prophets of Pediatric Psychiatry

Jeffrey Dach MD
7450 Griffin Road  Suite 180/190
Davie, Fl 33314
954-792-4663
http://www.jeffreydach.com
http://www.drdach.com
http://www.naturalmedicine101.com
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Links and references

1) http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/health/the-selling-of-attention-deficit-disorder.html