INVENTOR OF ADHD'S DEATHBED CONFESSION: "ADHD IS A FICTITIOUS DISEASE" Fortunately, the Swiss National Advisory Commission on Biomedical Ethics (NEK, President: Otfried Höffe) critically commented on the use of the ADHD drug Ritalin in its opinion of 22 November 2011 titled Human enhancement by means of pharmacological agents: The consumption of pharmacological agents altered the child’s behavior without any contribution on his or her part. That amounted to interference in the child’s freedom and personal rights, because pharmacological agents induced behavioral changes but failed to educate the child on how to achieve these behavioral changes independently. The child was thus deprived of an essential learning experience to act autonomously and emphatically which “considerably curtails children’s freedom and impairs their personality development”, the NEK criticized. The alarmed critics of the Ritalin disaster are now getting support from an entirely different side. The German weekly Der Spiegel quoted in its cover story on 2 February 2012 the US American psychiatrist Leon Eisenberg, born in 1922 as the son of Russian Jewish immigrants, who was the “scientific father of ADHD” and who said at the age of 87, seven months before his death in his last interview: “ADHD is a prime example of a fictitious disease” Since 1968, however, some 40 years, Leon Eisenberg’s “disease” haunted the diagnostic and statistical manuals, first as “hyperkinetic reaction of childhood”, now called “ADHD”. The use of ADHD medications in Germany rose in only eighteen years from 34 kg (in 1993) to a record of no less than 1760 kg (in 2011) – which is a 51-fold increase in sales! In the United States every tenth boy among ten year-olds already swallows an ADHD medication on a daily basis. With an increasing tendency. When it comes to the proven repertoire of Edward Bernays, the father of propaganda, to sell the First World War to his people with the help of his uncle’s psychoanalysis and to distort science and the faith in science to increase profits of the industry – what about investigating on whose behalf the “scientific father of ADHD” conducted science? His career was remarkably steep, and his “fictitious disease” led to the best sales increases. And after all, he served in the “Committee for DSM V and ICD XII, American Psychiatric Association” from 2006 to 2009. After all, Leon Eisenberg received “the Ruane Prize for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Research. He has been a leader in child psychiatry for more than 40 years through his work in pharmacological trials, research, teaching, and social policy and for his theories of autism and social medicine”. And after all, Eisenberg was a member of the “Organizing Committee for Women and Medicine Conference, Bahamas, November 29 – December 3, 2006, Josiah Macy Foundation (2006)”. The Josiah Macy Foundation organized conferences with intelligence agents of the OSS, later CIA, such as Gregory Bateson and Heinz von Foerster during and long after World War II. Have such groups marketed the diagnosis of ADHD in the service of the pharmaceutical market and tailor-made for him with a lot of propaganda and public relations? It is this issue that the American psychologist Lisa Cosgrove and others investigated in their study Financial Ties between DSM-IV Panel Members and the Pharmaceutical Industry7. They found that “Of the 170 DSM panel members 95 (56%) had one or more financial associations with companies in the pharmaceutical industry. One hundred percent of the members of the panels on ‘Mood Disorders’ and ‘Schizophrenia and Other Psychotic Disorders’ had financial ties to drug companies. The connections are especially strong in those diagnostic areas where drugs are the first line of treatment for mental disorders.” In the next edition of the manual, the situation is unchanged. “Of the 137 DSM-V panel members who have posted disclosure statements, 56% have reported industry ties – no improvement over the percent of DSM-IV members.” “The very vocabulary of psychiatry is now defined at all levels by the pharmaceutical industry,” said Dr Irwin Savodnik, an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of California at Los Angeles. This is well paid. Just one example: The Assistant Director of the Pediatric Psychopharmacology Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital and Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School received “$1 million in earnings from drug companies between 2000 and 2007”. In any case, no one can easily get around the testimony of the father of ADHD: “ADHD is a prime example of a fictitious disease.” The task of psychologists, educators and doctors is not to put children on the “chemical lead” because the entire society cannot handle the products of its misguided theories of man and raising children, and instead hands over our children to the free pharmaceutical market. Let us return to the basic matter of personal psychology and education: The child is to acquire personal responsibility and emphatic behavior under expert guidance – and that takes the family and the school: In these fields, the child should be able to lead off mentally. This constitutes the core of the human person. http://www.worldpublicunion.org/201...f-adhd-says-adhd-is-a-fictitious-disease.html
One quote and a ton of editorial opinion. Amusing. Der Speigel article it references: http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-83865282.html Google translate of concerned area: It sounds like he's saying "ADHD" isn't really a disease, but is psychosocial. I do think people are over-medicating children for these sorts of things as it's the easy thing to do, rather than find the source of the problem and solve that. It's unfortunate that we've gotten to that point. The article goes on to talk about other "diseases" that people are diagnosing children with. Unfortunately, I don't know German, so I can only stumble through it. Maybe ATW can help?
I suppose you know more than the pediatric neurologist that diagnosed me in 1977. I think that the disorder has been misdiagnosed since it started being psychologists making the diagnosis rather than neurologists. ADHD medically is a real disorder. I can tell you that, in my case, it was real. I did much better in school and socially once I was treated (medication and instruction in managing symptoms). Anybody who blanketly states that it is not real has either been duped or is just talking out of their ass.
As a parent with a 6 year old. Before Ritalin she got zeros on her tests at school and was daily getting marked for behavioral problems. After Ritalin, she is top of her class in most subjects and rarely gets in trouble now. She doesn't take Ritalin on weekends and she's fine however the adult to kid ratio is a little different at school where she's expected to be somewhat independent. She's fine if we are constantly stay on top of her.
I agree some with the OP. ADHD is a misnomer for the "disorder". People with ADHD often don't have trouble concentrating at all and can concentrate on things that have a bunch of activity (eg. video games) for hours and hours. Further, there are so many variations of ADD/ADHD that it becomes silly to try to classify it as one "disorder". ADHD and mild addictive behavior were great for my financial success lol. However, I always struggled with reading in school. I was diagnosed with "mild" ADHD my senior year of college. After I saw a few psychiatrists last year it seems that my reading problems were related to poor fundamentals in reading rather than some sort disorder in my brain. After doing more research it seems that many things can be corrected thru different education techniques (eg. Khan Academy).
Learning how to concentrate and focus is a skill that everyone has to learn similar to shooting a basketball, it's a skill. The people diagnosed with or think that they have ADHD simply haven't learned the skill of focus and concentration which is why Refman above noticed improvement in his "ADHD" once he started taking lessons and doing exercises, to learn how to concentrate property. Concentration isn't involuntary like breathing. It's a learned skill. Those who haven't yet learned it are "ADHD".
I'm also an up close and personal witness to this. People who say ADHD is fictitious are dead wrong. I'm sure it's overdiagnosed but those cases don't negate the legitimacy of the condition.
You are simply wrong. I was diagnosed by a pediatric neurologist and was medicated in addition to other therapies. Back then, it was simply ADD. It is a real, verifiable neurological disorder. It started being grossly over diagnosed when it stopped being diagnosed by neurologists and started being diagnosed by psychologists. You can tell the difference between properly diagnosed cases and those that are misdiagnosed by the patient's reaction to the medication. In those with a real case, it causes the brain to produce enough of the right neurochemicals to allow the child to function at their optimal level. When it is misdiagnosed, the medication revs them up like they are on speed. Unless you are a pediatric neurologist and can show me that I am wrong, I will trust the medical professionals that treated me as a child.
While you logic is backwards, I agree with you sentiment. Yes, it's a skill that can be practiced. But like any skill, some people are naturally better at it. I agree that ADHD isn't a "disease" but it does manifest itself as a personality trait that isn't compatible with society today. If you are a farm hand and rely on manual labor, that ADHD personality trait is naturally masked with physical activity and/or isn't detrimental to your job function. For your shooting baskets analogy, Calvin Murphy is naturally predisposed. Shaq isn't.
