Parents send their children off to school every day in hopes of them getting a good education and growing up to be mature responsible adults.  But what about child mental health?  Is that something you want addressed at your child’s school?  Are you aware of any sort of child mental health activities in existence at the school?  If not, perhaps your rights as a parent are at risk.

Back in the day it used to be there was a resident school nurse, who every September would note down height and weight and do a quick eye exam or something of the sort.  If you became ill during school hours, she would take your temperature and send you home.  Today the school nurse has largely been replaced with child mental health programs implemented in schools where students are screened for mental disorders.  Instead of being sent home with a fever, your child could be sent home with a diagnosis of mathematics disorder, reading disorder, ADHD, bipolar disorder, or a host of other so-called disorders.

It is vital that you know about any child mental health program in the school so that you as a parent remain in charge of your son or daughter’s health and welfare.   If your kids’ school does have a child mental health program in operation, it is very possible that your child could be screened for mental or behavioral disorders without your consent or knowledge.  Perhaps a parental consent form was legitimately sent out but didn’t make its way into the parents’ hands or, was conveniently overlooked.  In either case, the child or teen gets screened and that is the first step of your child’s mental health being under the direction of the school and not you.

These mental health screenings are a result of the government’s formation of the New Freedom Commission on Mental Health.  The goal is to screen all children through the school system and then the entire general public.  In theory, screening people in an effort to prevent something undesirable or to handle a condition before it gets worse is a good idea.  However, this does not apply to child mental health as it is impossible to screen someone for something that has never been proven medically or scientifically to exist.  Mental illnesses and mental disorders are only based on subjective opinions  and not on any physical evidence.  How else would school personnel ever be qualified to diagnose a mental or behavioral condition?

Additionally, some programs such as TeenScreen, admittedly have a false positive rate of 84-94 percent!  Imagine countless normal children being labeled with something they don’t have and put on a drug that has the strongest FDA warning of increased risk of suicide!  Imagine knowing that there is nothing wrong with your son or daughter and being told he/she must take a drug or you will be charged with child neglect! 

Needless to say, this is not some fly by night fluke of a situation to be ignored.  As a parent, you need to know these psychiatric drugs are prescribed to supposedly “improve” child mental health, but they actually alter the mind and are dangerous.  They have horrendous side effects such as violence, suicidal thoughts and mania to name a few.

This is why it would be a good idea to do your homework and find out what child mental health programs exist in your local schools.  That way you can exercise your rights as a parent so that you are informed on what can and can’t be done to your child without your consent.  Every parent should be allowed to raise and educate their child as they see fit.  Government or school intervention to handle behavioral problems in the name of mental health violates that right.  Get informed on your rights to informed consent.

 http://www.naturalnews.com/033969_mental_health_screening_teens.html

 http://www.naturalnews.com/026187.html

Dr. Dorval, a child psychiatrist hired to treat and medicate jailed children in Florida had formerly pleaded no contest to a felony grand theft charge. He had already used juvenile delinquents in state custody to bilk the government out of funds.

There are other cases of child psychiatrists taking jobs with the Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) after having been cited for law breaking or making grave medical errors in their past.

Dr. Dorval would have failed a state-mandated background check were he given one. In the late 1990s Dorval was found to be using bogus counselors to bill medicate for over $350,000.

All these claims were fraudulent, and included his billing the government for round the clock therapy. The children he used for this scheme were either in foster care, juvenile delinquents or homeless.

The child psychiatrist was charged with four felonies in Broward, but after pleading no contest to one count of grand theft in 2004 Dorval was allowed to keep his medical license after paying $10,000. His punishment? He was suspended and reprimanded, then put on four years of probation.

However, this plea did disqualify Dorval from seeing juvenile delinquents. Despite this, his employer (Miami based Compass Health Systems) sent him to the Broward Juvenile Detention Center in late 2007. His background was not checked.

In another example, Dr. Charles Dack had prescribed a dangerous cocktail of antidepressants and painkillers to one of his adult patients for six years. He increased her dosage to a toxic level for 2 ½ years, resulting in her death at the age of 42.

Yet he was allowed to prescribe drugs to jailed children.

In just two years, the state of Florida purchased huge amounts of powerful antipsychotic drugs for kids in state-run jails and other programs. The prescriptions were not tracked, and the child psychiatrists, based on their own opinions were given free rein to dose these kids.

Another such child psychiatrist was Dr. Samuel McClure. While practicing in Orlando, he diagnosed an 11 year old boy, David Morganthal, with ADD.  McClure prescribed powerful drugs, mirtazapine (which is not approved for use in children) and citalopram, an antidepressant, for David.

This again ended in tragedy. The youngster’s mother discovered David’s lifeless body on the floor of her mobile home. He was only four foot 2 inches and weighed 49 pounds, and was discovered to be way overmedicated due to his small size. The autopsy concluded he had most likely died from heart problems and a seizure caused by his reaction to the drugs.

David’s mother filed a suit alleging medical negligence against McClure and the health care company he worked for. Yet while the suit was pending, this child psychiatrist was hired to care for children at two separate facilities under the DJJ. (Frances Walker Halfway House and Brevard Group Treatment Home.)

Just a year later, McClure’s insurance company settled the suit for $500,000, yet McClure continued to work in DJJ programs.

Our troubled youth deserve better. To allow psychiatrists with shady pasts to drug juvenile delinquents and foster children is an act of supreme neglect, if not outright sadism. Our children are our future, and should not be used as pawns or a means to bilk the government out of much needed funds for the personal profit of a few unworthy child psychiatrists.

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/state/dosed-in-juvie-jail-troubled-doctors-hired-to-1549240.html?viewAsSinglePage=true

I’ve come to realize that the ten-minute med check is worse than worthless, as a ten-minute glimpse of a person’s day is more likely to lead to the prescribing of a harmful medication than a helpful one. . . . .

I have rejected the insurer’s model of psychiatric care– the 4-6 patient-per-hour, 10-minute med check.  I spend 90 minutes on the first appointment– often more.  And follow–up appointments last at minimum 30 minutes, and for more complicated cases, 60 minutes.  . . . .

The Value of Psychiatry? | An Epidemic of Addiction

The explosive trend to prescribe new anti-psychotic drugs, rather than listen and talk to patients, has not proven effective; but instead dangerous, particularly in children for whom the drugs were never intended.  Ritalin is legalized speed, and stunts body and skull growth in the young child, to whom it is most often prescribed.  So it is not in fact the children who benefit, but their caretakers, who find them much more manageable.

Ritalin is an authority drug. It keeps children in line. It makes teachers feel less stress and parents feel less guilt. Ritalin is a mind-altering narcotic, and yet millions of children are on it today. Its purpose is not to help children, but to make life more convenient for those who manage children.

The raw (and ugly) truth about the war on drugs

As has been noted throughout history, drugs cloud the mind and lower alertness and cognitive levels.  Psychiatric treatment entering into American schools is coincident with declining literacy levels and unprecedented violence.  A Canadian Court just ruled that a young teen was under the influence of Prozac when he became violent and killed his friend.  When he woke up from this Prozac-induced nightmare, this teen faced the fact that he had destroyed his friend’s life, and most certainly ruined his own.

In the Canadian case, Justice Heinrich concluded the medication set off a steady deterioration in the young killer’s behavior. “He had become irritable, restless, agitated, aggressive and unclear in his thinking,” the judge said. “It was while in that state he overreacted in an impulsive, explosive and violent way. Now that his body and mind are free and clear of any effects of Prozac, he is simply not the same youth in behavior or character.”

Why Would a Young Person Start Shooting in School? | Welcome to the Alliance for Natural Health – USA

Other horrors connected to these antipsychotic drugs include suicide, irreversible damage to the nervous system, metabolic disorders and diabetes, and sudden heart failure.  These side effects are well documented and have led the FDA to issue their highest-level (“black box”) warnings against them.  But not all doctors or patients read or heed these warnings, having been brainwashed to believe the false claims and slanted research results presented by drug companies who invest millions in lobbying and legalized advertising campaigns.   And so the American government hands over billions of Medicaid and Medicare dollars annually for top-dollar prescriptions of psychotropic drugs written for the elderly, foster care, military and prison populations.

The medical community has proven most effective when it does searching physical exams, often revealing underlying diseases which, when treated, end the psychiatric symptoms.  Nutrition, exercise, stress-relieving therapies, facing and dealing effectively with life problems, have all proven successful.  Statistics of medicated, versus non-medicated treatment prove drugs detrimental in the long run:

• People without medication suffer less from depression, blunted emotions and problems with movement.
• People diagnosed with schizophrenia in poor countries, where they are not treated with long-term antipsychotics, do much better than those in rich nations who are kept on medication.
• The majority of patients do well with no medication.
• Making sense of coming off psychiatric drugs | Mind

With pharmaceutical companies offering kickbacks to doctors who prescribe their drugs, it is apparent that most psychiatric treatment these days, is about wealth, not health.  What is spent annually by the government on pharmaceuticals could do much to remedy the country’s economic dilemma, itself a great cause of stress to Americans.  The truth, if one faces it, is that health depends not on meds, but the investment of time and effort on healthy life styles, natural diets and supplements, quality time spent with children, and the decision to really, not hypocritically, “Say No to Drugs!”

The raw (and ugly) truth about the war on drugs

A science, termed “Pharmacogenomics”, which is the study of human genetic and the variability in relation to drug action, is the one science that can help medical practitioners to determine how the patient will respond.  This science is vital to the life and well-being of each individual who enters a medical office or is placed in medical care. It is the science concerned with genetic differences in patients which cause varied responses to a single drug.

In layman’s terms, if an individual is prescribed an antidepressant, a medical test can be done to evidence the adverse effects the person will experience, long before the patient even fills the prescription.  This has tremendous implications for our society worldwide.  With the tragedies that occur throughout our state, our nation and the world, we owe it to ourselves to ensure that our loved ones come to no harm. Additionally, medical professionals have taken an oath, to do no harm but are ignoring the use of medical testing to ensure they keep that oath.

The article cites Dr. David Mrazek, Professor of Psychiatry at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, and reveals how   pharmacogenomics—the study of how an individual’s DNA affects medication response—might substantially reduce suffering and that despite the potential of this science to reduce adverse effects, mental health practitioners have been slow to accept and utilize these medical tests to evidence the drugs’ harmful effects.

Additionally, the article, relays a story about a 9-year-old boy who had been labeled with 3 different mental health disorders, administered a combination of 3 separate psychiatric drugs and later the young boy developed a number of symptoms, including low-grade fever, inco-ordination, and seizures. Ultimately, the boy died.

This and countless other deaths could have been avoided with the implementation of true medical science. This metabolic test can be used to evidence the potential for harm and death, prior to even considering the administering of these drugs.  The FDA lists the adverse effects, yet mental health practitioners use all types of “reasons” for why they will prescribe them despite those adverse effects, and then compounded with the fact they have not used medical testing to ever evidence the need for the drugs, they refuse to do genetic testing to determine if they are about to harm their patient and potentially cause death.

The article in the Psychiatric Times continues by giving examples of a number of psychiatric drugs, that if administered, and if the patient is a poor metabolizer of those drugs, there will be in fact and indeed “adverse—and even lethal—reactions.”

The nine year old, according to Dr. Mrazek, who died from these drugs “just couldn’t metabolize Prozac, and he had built up very toxic levels before anyone recognized it”.

The hardest things for anyone of us to accept are the most shocking or unbelievable ideas.  This is the case when examining this issue.  Medical practitioners neglecting to perform these genetic tests prior to prescribing.  Even more unbelievable and shocking is the fact that this article in the Psychiatric Times reveals that “some patients still die, even when the medication is stopped… this is because some patients have limited metabolic capacity.”

Dr. Mrazek discusses 14 genes that can be tested in relationship to the drug responses.  In regards to psychiatric drugs, Mrazek admits that “Safety concerns are highlighted by a series of FDA black box warnings over the past several years.”

The genetic tests, that could potentially prevent adverse and potentially lethal reactions to psychiatric drugs are, per the Psychiatric Times article, available “at all of the major reference laboratories in the United States, such as LabCorp and Quest Diagnostics.”

Know your rights, get informed and help inform your family and friends. After all, per recent news reports, 1 in 5 adults are taking psychiatric drugs and are at risk.

The federal government has not done enough to oversee the treatment of America’s foster children with powerful mind-altering drugs, according to a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report to be released Thursday. 

ABC News was given exclusive access to the GAO report, which capped off a nationwide yearlong investigation by ABC News on the overuse of the most powerful mind-altering drugs on many of the country’s nearly 425,000 foster children. 

The GAO’s report, based on a two-year-long investigation, looked at five states — Florida, Massachusetts, Michigan, Oregon and Texas. Thousands of foster children were being prescribed psychiatric medications at doses higher than the maximum levels approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in these five states alone. And hundreds of foster children received five or more psychiatric drugs at the same time despite absolutely no evidence supporting the simultaneous use or safety of this number of psychiatric drugs taken together

To read full story and to watch full Episode of Diane Sawyer’s TV Broadcast:  http://abcnews.go.com/US/study-shows-foster-children-high-rates-prescription-psychiatric/story?id=15058380

Nationally Known Psychiatrist Pleads in Gun Threat Case

James L. Schaller

A nationally known Naples [Florida] child psychiatrist who pointed a gun at his teenage son’s friend, then allegedly threatened his 15-year-old son, pleaded today to aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and was sentenced to probation.

Psychiatrist James L Schaller, 50, pleaded no contest to a third-degree felony involving a 14-year-old former neighbor as part of a plea deal that dropped a similar count involving his son, who had tried to intercede during an altercation on Jan. 2. The Daily News is withholding the minors’ names.

Assistant State Attorney James Stewart said the 14-year-old boy and his mother agreed to the plea deal, but have moved to Michigan and couldn’t attend sentencing. Schaller faced up to five years in state prison on each count, but had no prior record.

Standing in a gray suit, with a bandaged hand behind his back, Schaller told the judge it was “definitely” in his best interests not to go to trial. Collier Circuit Judge Fred Hardt then adjudicated him guilty and sentenced him to four years of probation on the condition he undergo a mental health evaluation and not contact the victim.

To read full story: http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2011/sep/21/nationally-known-child-psychiatrist-pleads-gun-thr/

Judge sends therapist to prison for 35 years in massive Medicare-fraud case
By Jay Weaver
jweaver@MiamiHerald.com

A convicted therapist whom prosecutors described as the public “face” of a Miami-based mental-health company that bilked Medicare was sentenced to a staggering 35 years in prison.

A federal judge Monday issued another lengthy sentence in the nation’s biggest mental-health fraud case, sending a Miami therapist to prison for 35 years.

The sentencing of Marianella Valera, 40, came only days after the same judge sent her 49-year-old boyfriend, Lawrence Duran, to prison for 50 years. The pair ran Miami-based American Therapeutic Corp, which prosecutors say defrauded the taxpayer-funded Medicare program of more than $200 million.

In both criminal cases, U.S. District Judge James Lawrence King gave out the longest prison sentences ever for a Medicare-fraud offender. Previously, the longest sentence was a 30-year term imposed in 2008 on a Miami physician convicted in an HIV-therapy scam.

Read more http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/09/19/2414969/judge-sends-therapist-to-prison.html#ixzz1YUxoB7s1

State suspends license of mental-health counselor
7:44 p.m. EDT, August 31, 2011
-Eloísa Ruano González

The Florida Department of Health has suspended the license of a Casselberry mental-health counselor. Health officials said David B. Bollet, a counselor at the Center for Counseling and Consulting, cannot practice safely because of an addiction to crack cocaine and marijuana and needs treatment. He was convicted of possession of cocaine and drug paraphernalia in 2011 and 2010, respectively.

Full article here:  http://www.orlandosentinel.com/health/os-state-suspends-counselor-20110831,0,7977113.story

More News Today:

As of Sept. 1, 2011, Today, Florida Statute 409.912(51)  is implemented.  This statute states, in regards to the prescribing of psychotropic drugs, that

“The agency may not pay for psychotropic medication prescribed for a child in the Medicaid program without the express and informed consent of the child’s parent or legal guardian. The physician shall document the consent in the child’s medical record and provide the pharmacy with a signed attestation of this documentation with the prescription.The physician shall document the consent in the child’s medical record and provide the pharmacy with a signed attestation of this documentation with the prescription.”

Entire Statute:  http://www.leg.state.fl.us/Statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=&URL=0400-0499/0409/Sections/0409.912.html

More news today:

Orlando Sentinel
Sept. 11, 2011

Florida’s prescription-drug database launches today Prescription-drug-monitoring program will deter doctor shopping, over-prescribing, supporters say.

To read full article: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/health/os-prescription-drug-monitoring-begins-20110901,0,2941249.story

Evan Zimmer psychiatrist – license suspended

Miami psychiatrist’s license suspended for drug use

By John Dorschner
jdorschner@MiamiHerald.com

The license of Evan Zimmer, a Miami psychiatrist who’s had previous legal problems involving prostitutes and drug abuse, was suspended by an emergency state order this week after he tested positive in July for cocaine and marijuana.

The Florida Department of Health order noted that Zimmer, 60, “has a significant history of substance abuse” and “an inability to practice medicine with reasonable skill and safety.”

Read more:

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/08/19/2366708/miami-psychiatrists-license-suspended.html#ixzz1VZ9zryDG

Anyone with an Internet connection can go online and see that Dr. Gold Smith Dorval is on probation with the Florida Board of Medicine and that his medical license was suspended because he stole money from Medicaid. Why, then, did the Department of Juvenile Justice allow him to treat children in state custody and prescribe powerful drugs for them?

DJJ’s inspector general should expand her already ongoing investigation into the department’s use of antipsychotic medications to answer that question. DJJ Secretary Wansley Walters ordered the inquiry after The Palm Beach Post reported that children in DJJ care are being prescribed heavy doses of the drugs.

A follow-up investigation by The Post’s Michael LaForgia showed that several of the psychiatrists doing the prescribing have troubled pasts that, by law, should bar them from working for the agency.

“We will look,” Ms. Walters said in an earlier interview, “at everything that surrounds this issue.”

Certainly, the qualifications of the doctors employed by the agency falls into that category. As The Post reported, some psychiatrists working for DJJ were cited for overprescribing drugs that led to patient deaths. A simple background check can reveal much about a doctor’s history. Even though DJJ requires such checks, in the case of Dr. Dorval and others, no one bothered.

DJJ does not have a system for tracking the medications taken by children in its care and has no way of knowing whether they actually need the prescriptions or if some of the doctors are drugging the kids simply to make them easier to control. When the doctor is someone like Charles Dack of Lakeland, who was disciplined for overprescribing drugs to a woman until she overdosed and died yet worked for DJJ until April, it’s easy to suspect the latter. And that’s unacceptable.

DJJ spokesman C.J. Drake said some doctors, such as Dr. Dorval, work for the agency through a third-party company. Those agencies should be required to prove that they have conducted background checks on all the doctors in their employ. Earlier this month, Georgetown University’s Center for Juvenile Justice Reform announced that Florida is one of four states selected to participate in its Juvenile Justice System Improvement Project. “The fact that Florida stepped up and applied,” said Shay Bilchik, founder and director of the center, “is a reflection of how seriously they take their responsibility.”

The seriousness with which the agency addresses this issue will be an even better reflection of its commitment to reform.

- Rhonda Swan,

for The Palm Beach Post Editorial Board