They told me the 80 year old man who'd had a stroke must be depressed – he wasn’t rehabilitating properly. Could I see him and look at whether the citalopram he’d been started on a week before needed tweaking? Jeff was solidly middle class, professional. He had never been ill before his stroke and never ever been mentally ill. He had a large loving close-knit family who came … [Read more...] about The Dram of Eale
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Homeland Security
In the latest hit series Homeland Claire Danes plays Carrie Mathison a CIA agent with bipolar disorder taking Clozapine. She takes the drug to prevent herself tipping over into frank paranoia in a world where being paranoid is necessary for survival. Anyone who knows anything about Clozapine knows Claire Danes is definitely not on it – she would not be as slim and svelte as … [Read more...] about Homeland Security
We Need To Talk About Doctors
Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) came into favor in the wake of thalidomide as a method to evaluate drugs and their risks. They were supposed to keep ineffective drugs off the market, but companies have learned that you can do any number of trials and if even some show a marginal benefit they can get their drug on the market and the others can be suppressed so no one has … [Read more...] about We Need To Talk About Doctors
Out of My Mind. Driven to Drink
Author: Anne-Marie (This story epitomizes what RxISK.org is all about. It shows one woman extraordinarily getting to grips with a problem she has on treatment. The hope when RxISK is up and running is that we will be able to make it easier for people like Anne-Marie to engage with their doctors to solve problems like this. Unfortunately even though clearly a drug-induced … [Read more...] about Out of My Mind. Driven to Drink
Model Doctors?
Another inquest may bring out the risks to doctors from their professional associations behaving as the American Psychiatric Association (APA) or the Irish College of Psychiatry has done (see Professional suicide – the Clancy case). She posed no suicide risk. She was put on citalopram Yvonne Woodley, a 42-year-old woman with two young daughters, ran into difficulties with her … [Read more...] about Model Doctors?
Professional Suicide
On October 15, 2004, after FDA had put a Black Box Warning on antidepressants to draw attention to the risk that they can cause suicide, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) came out with a news release whose key statement was: ‘The American Psychiatric Association believes that Antidepressants save lives.” This was perhaps the first professional suicide note in … [Read more...] about Professional Suicide
Zoloft Study: Mystery in Leeds
In my blog post The best bias that money can buy I outlined how doing trials of their drugs in conditions like depression is the ultimate way companies hide bodies. That what is needed instead are studies of drugs in healthy volunteers. Here’s a good example of what a healthy volunteer (phase 1) study can show, and how the story of antidepressants and suicide might have … [Read more...] about Zoloft Study: Mystery in Leeds
The Best Bias That Money Can Buy
Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) were adopted by FDA in 1962 following the thalidomide disaster. This was a way to manage the risks posed by potential poisons. If the toxicity from a drug could be shown to overcome to some extent the toxicity stemming from the illness, a risk-benefit ratio would be set up that would warrant taking the risk of giving the poison. But what … [Read more...] about The Best Bias That Money Can Buy
Press Release: Pharmageddon is here
For immediate release Toronto, February 28, 2012. Pharmaceutical companies have hijacked healthcare in America, and the results are life-threatening.In his new book, Pharmageddon, Dr. David Healy documents a riveting and terrifying story that affects us all. Healy also has an idea for the solution..."A medical classic the day it was published." "Pharmageddon is a must-read … [Read more...] about Press Release: Pharmageddon is here
The Spin That No Data Can Overcome
Roger Shepard's above illustration shows two tables of exactly the same size and shape. It’s an extraordinary example of how even when you know that the table tops are the same, the data changes nothing. The dynamics of perspective mean we continue to see things in the wrong way. Early on in the Prozac and Suicide controversy, Eli Lilly adopted a strategy that has “put … [Read more...] about The Spin That No Data Can Overcome