Are Too Many Pre-Schoolers Being Put on Anti-Psychotic Drugs?
Prescriptions of anti-psychotic drugs like Risperdal for pre-school kids have doubled in the last few years, according to a recent study from Columbia University. Now there are an estimated 500,000 children and adolescents receiving such drugs in the United States. Is it too much?
Only four in ten of the preschoolers who receive prescriptions for these powerful drugs have been given a proper mental health assessment, according to the Columbia study. That worries some experts. As one told the New York Times:
“There are too many children getting on too many of these drugs too soon.”
This quote was from Dr. Mark Olfson, professor of clinical psychiatry at Columbia and lead researcher in the new study, which was financed by the government.
Olfson and other researchers worry that the drugs can interfere with physical and mental development in young children. What many kids need is talk therapy, but it's cheaper and more convenient to medicate them, they say.
Read more in the Times' article here.
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