Stolen from BPD in OKC
By Reuters
The number of children aged 2 to 5 who have been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and prescribed powerful antipsychotic drugs has doubled over the past decade, according to research released on Friday.
The research suggests that while it is still rare to prescribe powerful psychiatric drugs to 2-year-olds, the practice is becoming more frequent.
The data, compiled from 2000 to 2007, and published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, could inform testimony at the upcoming Boston-area murder trials of the parents of 4-year-old Rebecca Riley. The girl died of an overdose of mood-stabilizing medication in 2006.
A Boston child psychiatrist, Kayoko Kifuji, diagnosed Riley with bipolar disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder when she was 30 months old, and placed her on several powerful drugs: Depakote, an antiseizure medication also used for bipolar disorder, and clonidine, a blood pressure medication.
Kifuji’s testimony may be crucial to the fate of Michael and Carolyn Riley, who face first-degree murder charges. A grand jury and a review by the state’s medical licensing board cleared the doctor of wrongdoing.
TrendingProsecutors claim the Rileys deliberately overmedicated their daughter to subdue her. The couple say they were following Kifuji’s instructions and their daughter died of pneumonia.
The case has shone the spotlight again on a debate within the psychiatric profession about whether bipolar disorder can be diagnosed in very young children and whether it is wise to prescribe powerful medications.
BIPOLAR TODDLERS?
Bipolar disorder, characterized by severe mood swings, was once thought to emerge only during adolescence or later. But Dr. Joseph Biederman, a child psychiatrist at Harvard University, transformed views on the subject by arguing that children could have the disorder at extremely young ages.
He is credited with spearheading a more than 40-fold increase in the number of children diagnosed with bipolar disorder over the past decade.
Biederman was accused in 2008 by Republican U.S. Senator Charles Grassley of failing to fully disclose payments by drug companies, including some that produced medication for bipolar disorder. Biederman declined to be interviewed about the latest study.
“The psychiatric diagnosis of very young children is anything but an exact science,” said Harry Tracy, a psychologist and publisher of NeuroInvestment, a monthly publication specializing in central nervous system disorders.
“Such disparate causes as ADHD, depression, bipolar disorder, sexual abuse, and family dysfunction can produce very similar symptoms in a toddler.”
The report’s author, Mark Olfson, professor of clinical psychiatry at Columbia University, said about 1.5 percent of all privately insured children between the ages of 2 and 5, or one in 70 children, received some sort of psychotropic drug — whether an antipsychotic, a mood stabilizer, a stimulant or an antidepressant — in 2007.
If a child is diagnosed with bipolar disorder between the ages of 2 and 5, about half are prescribed an antipsychotic, such as Eli Lilly & Co’s Zyprexa, AstraZeneca Plc’s Seroquel, and Johnson & Johnson’s Risperdal. They are prescribed to about one in 3,000 2-year-olds, according to his report.
“There might be a role for these drugs but only after you’ve tried other interventions, with the parents, or with the parents and child together, but that is not happening when you examine the billing records,” Olfson said.
I want to hear your thoughts on this before I step up onto my soap box. Oh believe me, I will step up onto my soap box. Probably before I’ve even given people a chance to respond.
-Edit-
My response is in the comments.
This just pisses me off.
Pat and I joke that all toddlers are bipolar. But the bottom line is, little kids are moody. They are just learning how to have emotions and gasping them and controlling them is beyond their control. This is why they can be happy one moment and throwing a temper tantrum the next. This is how young kids are. They don't change this behavior until their brains have had a chance to mature. This happens around the time they hit grade school.
Does this mean they need medication? Hell no! They need patience and understanding and a full chance to experience their emotions. They will learn to control them in time. If they don't and they become a bipolar teenager, then it's time to talk medication. Even then I'm a little leery on it. Do some teens need medication? Most certainly. But a lot of teens are just experiencing adolescence. It's a bitch but then you grow out of it. Now, if your teenager is experiencing suicidal impulses or bipolar (or other mental illnesses) like symptoms to the extreme then yes it's time to medicate. But only then.
Americans are so quick to medicate everything. Why learn to live with and control your emotions when you can just pop a pill and numb them away. Don't get me wrong, medication has it's place. I myself pop a dozen, not quite, pills a day. But when I don't, I can't function and I want to kill myself. It's risk verses benefit.
No one younger than I say 15 should ever have to take brain altering drugs. Their brains are still maturing. Except maybe when ADD is the case. Or when they, like me, can't function. But certainly no one who isn't old enough to even be in school. They don't even need to function. Let their brains mature in peace. Let them mature enough to cope. For Pete's sake. Give their brains a chance to work it out on their own.
Hi my baby can't even talk but he takes brain altering meds. I'm sorry, but that's just stupid.
I read a different article on this same topic recently and my thoughts mirror yours. I know young children can be mentally ill, the case of the 6 yr old in California who was featured in the LA Times because she was diagnosed with schizophrenia is a clear example, but children like that are the RARE exception.
Statistics like the 1 in 70 privately insured youngsters being doped up on psychotropic meds are very disturbing. Every other possible avenue should be tried first before resorting to mind altering medications in children so young.