Psych Observer - Exposing Bad Psychiatry » Fraud

South Tampa psychiatrist accused of pointing shotgun at pool man cuts deal

Administrator — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 02:21:22 +0000

By Alexandra Zayas, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Wednesday, March 31, 2010

TAMPA — A South Tampa psychiatrist accused of pointing a shotgun at a pool cleaner agreed Tuesday to enter a program that could lead to the charges being dropped.

James Roy Edgar, 64, told police he repeatedly asked pool cleaners not to park in the private driveway of his townhouse, 3105 W San Isidro St., when they serviced pools in the complex behind his.

Stephen Lafoe, an employee of Bay Area Pool Service, said he got a work order directing him to reach the pool June 9 through an alley. When he couldn’t find the alley, he stopped to make notes and plug his next stop into his GPS.

That’s when Edgar came out of his house.

The pool cleaner said he ignored Edgar the first time he yelled. The psychiatrist said Lafoe mouthed off. Edgar left and returned with a shotgun.

Lafoe said the doctor pointed it at him and said, “I told you to move.” Edgar said he held the gun, but didn’t point it. He held it in self-defense, he said, afraid of the much younger pool cleaner.

He was arrested in September and released after posting $2,000 bail.

Edgar’s attorney declined to comment Tuesday. Edgar’s charges will be dropped if he successfully completes a pretrial intervention program for first-time offenders. The specific conditions Edgar must meet were not discussed in court Tuesday, but could include counseling, classes and supervision.

Charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, he faced five years in prison.

Reach Alexandra Zayas at azayas@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3354.

URL: http://www.tampabay.com/news/courts/criminal/south-tampa-psychiatrist-accused-of-pointing-shotgun-at-pool-man-cuts-deal/1083818

A Canadian psychiatrist charged with sexually abusing a male patient

Administrator — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 20:41:57 +0000

Chris McGreal in Washington
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 28 March 2010 19.47 BST

Canadian police investigate dozens of allegations against psychiatrist nicknamed for use of electricity to ‘cure’ gay soldiers.

A leading Canadian psychiatrist who kept accusations of gross human rights abuses in apartheid-era South Africa hidden has been charged in Calgary with sexually abusing a male patient and is being investigated over dozens of other allegations.

Dr Aubrey Levin, who in South Africa was known as Dr Shock for his use of electricity to “cure” gay military conscripts, was arrested after a patient secretly filmed the psychiatrist allegedly making sexual advances. Levin, who worked at the University of Calgary’s medical school, has been suspended from practising and is free on bail of C$50,000 (£32,000) on charges of repeatedly indecently assaulting a 36-year-old man.

The police say they are investigating similar claims by nearly 30 other patients. The Alberta justice department is reviewing scores of criminal convictions in which Levin was a prosecution witness.

Levin has worked in Canada for 15 years since leaving South Africa, where he was chief psychiatrist in the apartheid-era military and became notorious for using electric shocks to “cure” gay white conscripts. He also held conscientious objectors against their will at a military hospital because they were “disturbed” and subjected them to powerful drug regimens.

South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission heard that Levin was guilty of “gross human rights abuses” including chemical castration of gay men. But after arriving in Canada in 1995 he managed to suppress public discussion of his past by threatening lawsuits against news organisations that attempted to explore it.

Following the arrest, other male patients have contacted the authorities. One, who was not identified, told CTV in Canada that he had gone to Levin for help with a gambling addiction and alleged he had been questioned about his sex life and subject to sexual advances.

The arrest has raised questions about how Levin was allowed to settle in Canada. Canada admitted other South African medical practitioners accused of human rights abuses, including two who worked with Wouter Basson, known as Dr Death for his oversight of chemical and biological warfare experiments that included the murder of captured Namibian guerrillas.

Levin, who made no secret of his hard rightwing views and was a member of the ruling National party during apartheid, has a long history of homophobia.

In the 1960s, he wrote to a parliamentary committee considering the abolition of laws criminalising homosexuality saying that they should be left in place because he could “cure” gay people.

His efforts to do just that in the army began in 1969 at the infamous ward 22 at the Voortrekkerhoogte military hospital near Pretoria, which ostensibly catered for service personnel with psychological problems. Commanding officers and chaplains were encouraged to refer “deviants” for electroconvulsive aversion therapy.

The treatment consisted of strapping electrodes to the upper arm. Homosexual soldiers were shown pictures of a naked man and encouraged to fantasise, and then the power was ratcheted up.

Trudie Grobler, an intern psychologist on ward 22, saw a lesbian subjected to severe shocks.

“It was traumatic. I could not believe her body could handle it,” she said later.

One gay soldier claimed to have been chemically castrated by Levin. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was told by investigators that he was not alone. It also heard that at least one patient had been driven to suicide. Levin refused to testify before the commission.

Levin also treated drug users, principally soldiers who smoked marijuana, and men who objected to serving in the apartheid-era military on moral grounds, who were classified as “disturbed”.

Levin subjected some patients to narco-analysis or a “truth drug”, involving the slow injection of a barbiturate before the questioning began. In an interview with the Guardian 10 years ago, he did not deny its use but said it was solely to help soldiers suffering from post-traumatic stress.

Levin said he left South Africa only because of the high crime rate, and denied abusing human rights. He said electric shock therapy was a standard “treatment” for gay people at the time and those subjected to it did so voluntarily.

“Nobody was held against his or her will. We did not keep human guinea pigs, like Russian communists; we only had patients who wanted to be cured and were there voluntarily,” he told the Guardian in 2000.

URL: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/mar/28/aubrey-levin-charged-sexually-abusing-patient

L.A. psychiatrist accused of improper relations with two patients

Administrator — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 20:22:39 +0000

A Los Angeles psychiatrist has agreed to have his medical license placed on probation after a state agency accused him of having controlling and improper relationships with two adult patients, a brother and sister.

In an accusation filed by the Medical Board of California, the state agency that disciplines doctors, Dr. Norman J. Lachman, 68, of Los Angeles, was alleged to have struck and humiliated the brother — including forcing the man to buy dog food, which the doctor threatened to make him eat.

In addition, the board alleged that Lachman had “very discomforting” sessions with the sister, telling her she was a “hot tamale” and instructing her to stop attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings even though she had a drinking problem.

Under the terms of the settlement, Lachman did not admit to any of the allegations but did waive his right to contest them. The action by the board is relatively rare; in the fiscal year ending in June, the most recent available, 91 out of 127,000 licensed doctors had a license put on probation, and 80 who were being investigated either surrendered a license or had it revoked.

Lachman’s attorney, Peter Osinoff, called the allegations “outlandish.” He said his client agreed to probation of his license for five years because he is disabled and did not have the financial resources to rebut the board’s claims.

Lachman was disabled in a 1994 car accident, and his medical license had been inactive since then, which meant he was precluded from practicing medicine. Prior to that accident, he had treated the brother and sister — identified in the complaint by initials only — during family therapy when they were teenagers.

Six years later, in 2000, the sister contacted Lachman when she was having problems with a boyfriend. Her brother contacted Lachman the same year to seek a referral to another psychiatrist, but according to the state board’s accusation, Lachman instead encouraged him to resume therapy with him.

Osinoff said Lachman’s relationship with the brother and sister after they got back in touch with him was strictly social.

“He did not see them as patients, never took any funds from them,” Osinoff said.

The medical board, however, maintained that Lachman was in a physician-patient relationship with both siblings. The agency alleged that in sessions at Lachman’s home between 2000 and 2004, Lachman struck the brother in the stomach, chest and legs with a cane, used his hand to strike the man in his testicles and called him stupid and crazy.

The accusation also detailed Lachman’s alleged efforts to insult and humiliate his patient: referring to him by a girl’s name, asking him to send photos of his girlfriends nude for Lachman to keep and making sexual innuendoes about his sister, among others.

The accusation said that instead of traditional payments, the brother made out checks to Lachman’s accountant or wrote “gift” on the checks. At one point, the medical board said, Lachman made the brother buy him a $3,400 computer.

According to the complaint, Lachman suggested the brother and sister take him out to dinner at restaurants, where the therapeutic sessions continued. Medical board officials said Lachman attempted to cash three checks from the brother totaling more than $73,000.

By then, the brother had ended his sessions and stopped payment on the checks, which had been written months earlier.

“The standard of practice requires avoidance of conflicting relationships, and the avoidance of treatment modalities involving physical abuse, emotional abuse and berating, insulting and demeaning behavior toward patients,” the state accusation said.

– Rong-Gong Lin II

URL: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/12/psychiatrist-surrenders-license-after-being-accused-of-improper-relations-with-patients.html

“Science Pimping” Psychiatrist – Nemeroff – took millions of dollars from drugmakers

Administrator — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 05:08:07 +0000

BY JOHN DORSCHNER
jdorschner@MiamiHerald.com

Charles Nemeroff, an Atlanta psychiatrist who was the subject of a Senate investigation concerning huge sums he received from drug companies, has been named chairman of the psychiatry department at the University of Miami.

Last year Nemeroff, as the top psychiatrist at Emory University, was the focus of an investigation by Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who said he was concerned about the millions the psychiatrist received from drug companies while conducting supposedly unbiased research for the National Institutes of Health on drugs made by the companies he was receiving money from.

On Thursday, Pascal Goldschmidt, dean of UM medical school, called Nemeroff “an exceptional psychiatrist and an exceptional scientist who has one issue in which he recognizes he made a mistake,” in not telling Emory how much he was getting from drug makers.

Goldschmidt said he had read investigative reports from Emory about Nemeroff’s activities and Emory found nothing to indicate that payments the psychiatrist received had in any way influenced his research results.

Elsewhere, opinions are divided.

The former head of psychiatry at Duke University told The Miami Herald Thursday that Nemeroff was “economical with the truth” and his work can’t be trusted, while the leader of the Columbia University psychiatry program said Nemeroff was a top-flight scientist and he had never seen any bias in his work.

For his own part, Nemeroff, 60, said he was excited to be coming to Miami. “I think it’s going to be a top-10 school.”

PAYMENT DISCLOSURE

Nemeroff’s appointment comes at a time when healthcare reform bills in both the House and Senate have sections requiring healthcare providers to publicly reveal their payments to doctors.

In October 2008, the psychiatrist’s activities made the front page of The New York Times after Grassley investigators found that Nemeroff — “one of the nation’s most influential psychiatrists,” according to The Times — had received $2.8 million in consulting deals with drug makers over seven years and failed to report at least $1.2 million of that to Emory.

Based on Grassley’s complaints, Nemeroff’s work on a mayor NIH grant was suspended and Emery asked him to step down as chair of psychiatry while it studied his conduct.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that the Office of the Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services had launched an investigation into Nemeroff’s activities. An OIG spokesman said it never confirms nor denies investigations. Nemeroff said he knew nothing about OIG looking at him.

According to published reports, the psychiatrist received between $800,000 to $1.2 million from GlaxoSmithKline while leading a major study into mood disorder drugs, including ones made by GSK.

Nemeroff said Thursday that the news reports had not made clear that his talks were on GSK drugs now on the market, while his research funded by NIH involved basic lab studies of GSK chemical compounds that were years away from market. That work did not promote GSK products, he told The Herald.

`SCIENCE PIMPING’

But Bernard Carroll, former head of psychiatry at Duke University and once Nemeroff’s boss, said parts of Nemeroff’s work involved Paxil, a GSK antidepressant. “Basically, he was doing basic science pimping for Paxil to produce talking points,” Carroll told The Herald in an e-mail Thursday. “All he ever produced was speculation but that was enough to satisfy Glaxo marketing. . . . I have been exposing his shenanigans for some years.”

Jeffrey Lieberman, head of psychiatry at Columbia University, praised Nemeroff as a leading expert in “basic neuroscience,” studying underlying pathologies and proteins in the brain that cause mental illness. He said he had never detected “any undue influence or bias” in Nemeroff’s research.

However, all the academics interviewed Thursday acknowledged that large payments to researchers were a concern. “Of course, it creates problems,” Carroll said.

At UM, Goldschmidt said it was important for researchers and pharmaceutical companies to work together to develop better drugs. He said limits of how much researchers should be allowed to receive are still being debated.

In June, the Pew Prescription Project gave UM a “B” on a scorecard designed to measure ethical policies on professors’ relationship with the pharmaceutical industry.

REQUIREMENTS

UM is now in the process of strengthening its reporting requirements, said Goldschmidt, so that all outside professional work must be reported — and the results will eventually be posted online for the public to see.

Those requirements will apply to Nemeroff, who starts at UM on Dec. 1, and all other medical school staffers.

In the past, Goldschmidt said, there was debate whether professors needed to report fees from drug makers for giving continuing medical education (CME) talks, which are supposed to be non-promotional. That became an issue in Nemeroff’s case in Atlanta.

In an interview Thursday, Nemeroff said in retrospect he should have declared the CME payments he received from drug makers, but he viewed Emory standards as not requiring such revelations.

LETTER OF SUPPORT

In a letter to Grassley last December, Emory officials wrote: “We do not believe that Dr. Nemeroff’s participation in the compensated speaking arrangements with GSK in any way biased the research conducted under the grant.”

The letter said Nemeroff’s talks on behalf of GSK were “focused on medical education and were not product specific or promotional. . . . As you alleged, Dr. Nemeroff did not disclose substantial speaking fees from pharmaceutical companies to Emory. Under federal regulations and Emory’s policies, we believe he should have done so, although both the regulations and our policies could have been clearer.”

Grassley responded in a letter that his staff’s research found that Nemeroff’s talks were promoting GSK products — not educational — and should have been reported.

Tom Johnson, former president of the CNN network and former publisher of The Los Angeles Times, said Thursday he was part of an Emory advisory board that examined Nemeroff’s behavior and the university’s ethics policies. The policies were “confusing,” Johnson told The Herald. They have since been modified.

`HE’S BRILLIANT’

“He’s brilliant,” Johnson said of Nemeroff. “He was responsible for a significant number of grants and he built up the department. Miami’s getting a truly gifted psychiatrist.”

Johnson said he has suffered from depression for years, and Nemeroff’s treatment of him was outstanding. “I’m not sure if I’d be around today if it weren’t for him.”

In Miami, Goldschmidt said Nemeroff was multidimensional — strong in basic research, treatment of patients and building programs such as suicide prevention.

His biography lists stints as president of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology and the American College of Psychiatrists. He has published more than 750 research reports and reviews.]

“I know I’m going to take a little smack in the face for this hire,” Goldschmidt said. “But you don’t do anything important without taking some risks. It’s very important that the people of Miami have access to a phenomenal psychiatrist like this.”

URL: http://www.miamiherald.com/103/story/1319569.html

Misdiagnosed and mistreatment of a child with past head injury labeled and drugged with a mental illness

Administrator — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 02:30:11 +0000

Earlier this year a 7-year-old boy in state custody prescribed mind altering drugs threatened to kill himself, then he did. This summer another child on powerful drugs also threatened to kill himself, his mother called Help Me Howard, what happened after that? Tonight here is Patrick Fraser with a story we call a mothers hope.

Reported by: Patrick Fraser
Producer: Patrick Fraser
Contact: pfraser@wsvn.com

7 News Investigation reports

WSVN — When I first met Anthony he was not the child who had been described to me.

Hope Estrada, Anthony’s Mother: “I’ve been told by some doctors in Key West that I’m raising the next Charles Manson, OK?”

One doctor said he was mentally retarded, another said he was bi-polar. He has been sent to psychiatric hospitals, slapped in straight jackets and given mind altering drugs. The affect of it all on an 8-year-old is not surprising.

Hope Estrada: “The other day when he was Baker Acted and they restrained him, he told me, ‘Mom, I want to kill myself, I don’t want to live like this, I can’t control myself.’”

Hope says she was told a few weeks ago, by the State of Florida the best solution is to give up on Anthony.

Hope Estrada: “Basically I’ve been told, you know, move on with your life, and give Anthony to the state and let him become a ward of the state. I’m not going to do that, I refuse to give in.”

And so, after contacting dozens of people from the president on down she called Help Me Howard and we knew this case required an expert.

Howard Finkelstein: “I knew that Anthony needed a lawyer that was an expert in both DCF how kids were treated medications, mental health issues and the only person that came to mind was the best person was Andrea Moore.”

Andrea Moore, a noted child advocate, agreed to take Anthony’s case for free. It took weeks of her time, but as she met with Hope and Anthony, interviewed specialists and dug through his medical records, many things bothered her.

Andrea Moore, Child Advocate: “They didn’t know his IQ. This is the place he’s been three times in three years, they didn’t know his IQ, and he’s very smart, yet some of the paperwork that I saw, said he was mentally retarded. The conflicting information in the records tells me that people didn’t really carefully read the records.”

The heavy doses of three mind altering drugs used on adults troubled Andrea, even more frightening she believes Anthony may not have even needed those drugs.

Andrea Moore: “I started to wonder if we were dealing with a head injury, as opposed to a psychiatric, purely psychiatric situation.”

Turns out Andrea was right, Anthony did have a prior head injury. He fell and fractured his skull when he was eight months old, but he had never had a brain scan, instead private doctors hired by the state concluded he had psychiatric problems.

Patrick Fraser: “Why did it take you to notice this, when he is under the care of a psychiatrist, and has seen more doctors then you and I have probably seen in our lives combined? Why did it take you coming in from the outside to see that?”

Andrea Moore: “This is a terrible question Patrick.”

Andrea is modest and polite, Howard is blunt.

Howard Finkelstein: “They had diagnosed him wrong, they treated him wrong, and as a result of the misdiagnosis and mistreatment, I believe they were making him worse.”

With DCF’s help, Andrea got Anthony off the powerful drugs and moved from the psychiatric hospital. To Jackson Memorial’s highly touted brain injury center.

Patrick Fraser: “Good to see you my man.”

Today Anthony is getting the evaluations Andrea thinks he needs, and our investigation is bringing changes. When he was put in one psychiatric hospital Hope was forced to sign this letter that says if Hope has complaints about treatment or abuse she would not report it to DCF.

Jacqui Colyer, DCF Regional Director: “That I think is what keeps DCF on its feet.”

When DCF saw the document they moved quickly.

Jacqui Colyer: “We have spoken with all of our provider agencies just to let them know that they can not tell families when to call or not to call us, because that is a part of their rights.”

DCF also applauded Hope for fighting so hard for her son, but they say she did misunderstand one thing, that the state would have only taken custody of Anthony temporarily, not permanently, but thing is indisputable without Hope, Anthony was doomed.

And of course Hope and Anthony could not have done it without Andrea Moore.

Howard Finkelstein: “Andrea gave us her time her energy and her expertise and she fought along with Hope to save Anthony, you and I, we were just along for the ride.”

Got to see a little boy get a chance to just be a normal little boy.

Hope to Patrick: “Thank you. God bless you, because if it wasn’t for you, or Andrea, or Howard, my son would not get the help he needs Patrick, you are my guardian angel. I swear to God you are Anthony’s guardian angel and I owe you so much for this, I really really do.”

Finally Hope is wrong, Anthony has hope because of his mother’s hope

Patrick told me Anthony called him the other day and said he would really like to get a dog to make sure Patrick didn’t forget Anthony. faxed a picture of the kind of dog he wants he is getting better all right.

URL with Video: http://www.wsvn.com/features/articles/investigations/MI132922

Anna Nicole Smith’s Psychiatrist Prescribed Suicide

Administrator — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 16:12:03 +0000

26-Sep-2009
Written by: Kayla L. Cubbage

Anna Nicole Smith’s psychiatrist gave her a number of prescriptions that allegedly lead to death.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Anna Nicole Smith’s psychiatrist, whom she saw after the death of her son, prescribed her a variation of “pharmaceutical suicide.”

Khristine Eroshevich, Smith’s psychiatrist, prescribed her various prescription drugs that ultimately produced a deadly consequence. Smith’s internist Sandeep Kapoor also participated in writing Smith orders. Pharmacists’ refused several times to refill the drugs, in the best interest of Smith. “They are going to kill her with this,” one of the pharmacists told the Times.
Five days after Smith had lost her son, Daniel, and only a little over a week after giving birth to daughter, Dannielynn, Eroshevich put in orders for 300 methadone tablets, a muscle relaxer, an anti-inflammatory, and four bottles of a painkiller referred to as “hospital heroine.”

One pharmacist attempted to call Kapoor and explain that the drugs would kill Smith. Those messages allegedly went ignored. Five months later, Smith died from a drug overdose.

Kapoor and Eroshevich are both facing charges of illegally prescribing controlled substances and retaining opiate prescriptions by fraud.

URL: http://www.thecelebritycafe.com/features/34031.html

Psychatrist is charged with DUI and many drug charges

Administrator — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 16:03:32 +0000

Published: Saturday, September 26, 2009 at 12:01 a.m.
Last Modified: Sunday, September 27, 2009 at 4:43 a.m.

Dr. Paul John Hartmann, a psychiatrist practicing in South Lakeland, was arrested in Tampa on Friday on seven charges of possession of a controlled substance, two charges of possession of a drug without a prescription and a charge of driving under the influence.

Hartmann, 60, a board-certified psychiatrist with subspecialty certification in child and adolescent psychiatry, has a Tampa address on his Hillsborough County arrest record. But he is listed with the state Department of Health, and in the phone book, as practicing at 6700 S. Florida Ave. in Lakeland. His DOH record shows a clear license without a record of discipline.

Hartmann was released on $15,500 bail.

URL: http://www.theledger.com/article/20090926/NEWS/909279995/1134?Title=Doctor-Arrested-On-Drug-Charges

Channel 7 News Fox WSVN-TV distastefully promotes drug research company for children

Administrator — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 22:24:30 +0000

On September 14th 2008 roughly around 5:23PM EST I was watching my local news, Channel 7 News Fox WSVN-TV, when a subject called “Defeat Depression” came to my interests. It showed an obese teenager named David Harvey playing a wrestling game at the beginning of the report and then it continues on as it shows him and his mother, Jeri Jashnoff, playing a cardboard game, sorry! (ironically). To make the story run short it explains that David’s mother losing her job in real estate from the bad economy and how worry some the teenager becomes after finding out that he can no longer get what he wants anymore because of the tight budget. Because his mother couldn’t afford the dangerous psychotropic drugs from her job lost she took him to a research facility called Segal Institute For Clinical Research where people get paid to become guinea pigs and take experimental drugs that hasn’t yet been approved by the FDA.

Richard Lemus interviewed the atrocious Psychiatrist, Dr. Scott Segal the owner of the Segal Institute for Clinical Research and has said:

Dr. Scott Segal, Psychiatrist, Segal Institute for Clinical Research: “It’s definitely making adults depressed, and therefore the children depressed, as well. However, they have less money to spend on treatments, and these days insurance companies have higher co-payments and it’s very difficult for people to come in.”

Even scarier, it’s hard for patients or their families to pay for the medications they so desperately need.

Dr. Scott Segal: “They get their visits and their evaluations and whatever is needed in the study for free, as well as medications. In fact, in research studies, the treatment is above the normal level of care.”

Patients will often try out new drugs that aren’t on the market yet and many times they can stay on that medication after the study is over.

Dr. Scott Segal: “In many studies, after the study is over, the pharmaceutical company will give them a compassionate care and allow them take the medications for a period of time.”

David is on a new medication and sees a doctor weekly. He and his mom have high hopes for the future.

What Richard Lemus and the Channel 7 News Fox WSVN-TV fail to revel to the public is that theirs other ways to defeat depression without the usage of the dangerous drugs. It’s called proper diet, exercise and proper outdoor activities like going to the beach or going to a park. In the whole segment of the story reported by Richard Lemus nowhere did it mention natural ways to deal with depression.

Transcript from this story can be seen on: URL: http://www.wsvn.com/features/articles/medicalreports/MI131332

Whistleblower Allen Jones/Mental health screening of kids

Administrator — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 15:39:00 +0000

Whistleblower Allen Jones gained international press coverage after uncovering pharmaceutical industry payments to government officials for the purpose of implementing a national mental health screening/psychotropic drug treatment plan. In this video interview Jones describes the pharma funding and psycho/pharma agenda behind mental health “screening” of schoolchildren. He is a former investigator for the Pennsylvania Office of the Inspector General.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GhBfDMW2Fo[/youtube]

For more information go to

http://www.cchrint.org/2009/08/26/teen-screen-cynical-deception-dangerous-illusion/

Drugs misused on foster kids

Administrator — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 02:25:03 +0000

BY CAROL MARBIN MILLER
cmarbin@MiamiHerald.com

Admitting for the first time what critics have claimed for years, state child-welfare authorities say caregivers for children in state custody frequently use powerful mind-altering drugs to manage unruly kids, rather than treat their anger and sadness.A panel of child-welfare experts, including two top administrators from the state Department of Children & Families, examined the death of a 7-year-old Broward foster child who was on psychotropic medications — without the required consent — when he hanged himself in a Margate home.

The panel’s report, expected to be released publicly later this month, says child welfare authorities too often rely on the potent medications to manage abused and neglected children — but fail to offer psychiatric treatment to help them overcome the trauma they suffered.

“Psychotherapeutic medications are often being used to help parents, teachers and other child workers quiet and manage, rather than treat, children,” the report says. It adds: “We have not clearly articulated the standard of psychiatric care expected for children in state foster care.”

Gabriel Myers hanged himself from a detachable shower hose April 16 at a Broward foster home. He had been in foster care since the previous June, when his mother had been found slumped in her car, surrounded by a stash of narcotics.

After The Miami Herald reported that Gabriel had been given several psychiatric drugs linked by federal regulators to potentially dangerous side effects, including suicide, DCF Secretary George Sheldon appointed a work group to study the care given to the boy, as well as the agency’s overall reliance on mind-altering drugs.

Sheldon said Wednesday that serious questions arose over why so many children in state care are on psychotropic medications — and why so many claim they feel fine once the drugs are discontinued.

“There was a lot of evidence presented to the work group — from kids and from folks in the system — raising a lot of concern over the purpose of these drugs,” Sheldon said.

Sheldon cautioned that the draft of the report is not final and “is subject to a lot of change” after work group members review and tweak it.

An overarching theme of the work group’s discussions, and of the draft report, was the lack of a parent figure — or “champion” — for Gabriel, who the report said had become “overwhelmed” by change and disruption. While the youngster’s life crumbled around him, caseworkers took copious notes and documented each new development.

But the report says, “there was no sense of urgency driving the agencies and individuals responsible for the welfare of Gabriel Myers,” and “no one person stepped forward to act as his parent.”

Though Gabriel was in regular contact with agency-referred therapists and a psychiatrist, the report says, the “intensive therapy” was aimed almost exclusively at preventing the reoccurrence of sexually inappropriate behaviors that may have resulted from his molestation when he was a small child in Ohio.

“Gabriel Myers was not provided specific and upfront therapy to deal with identified trauma, possible post-traumatic stress disorder, and depression,” the report says.

The use of psychiatric drugs among children in state care is widespread.

Records updated by DCF last week show that, among children in state care aged 6-12, more than 22 percent are being given psychiatric drugs.

Almost one-third of the adolescents aged 13 to 17 are on psychiatric drugs, the updated records say.

Among the adolescents, close to four in 10 children in licensed foster care are on such drugs.

The smallest percentage of adolescents taking psychiatric drugs, 12 percent, live with relatives or family friends.

For almost a decade, children’s advocates have maintained that Florida has used potentially dangerous psychiatric drugs as “chemical restraints” on children who endured hellish abuse and neglect — and act out, sometimes violently, as a result.

“It’s heartening that they are admitting what has long been the agency’s dirty little secret,” said Coral Springs attorney and children’s advocate Andrea Moore, who told a DCF Broward administrator in 2001 that doctors were concocting mental health diagnoses for foster kids to justify using unnecessary drugs.

Among the report’s other findings:

• Foster children being administered psychiatric drugs with federal “black box” warnings of potentially dangerous side effects are not “adequately monitored” by foster parents, doctors or caseworkers. The children are not well-informed or involved in decisions about their medication.

• Caregivers for the state’s foster children are not required to report adverse incidents arising from psychotropic medication.

• Psychiatrists and pediatricians “often lack [a] medical history” for the foster children they treat, “yet still prescribe medications.”

• Biographical, medical and educational information contained in the Florida Safe Families Network, DCF’s statewide child-welfare database, is “frequently incomplete and inaccurate.”

• A “significant” number of dependent children have been given psychiatric drugs without the informed consent of a parent or judge, as state law requires. “Too often, parents and/or the court are unaware of critical issues involving medications, procedures are not followed, and documentation requirements are ignored.”

• Mental healthcare for foster children is “fragmented,” poorly funded and often does not include caregivers, who receive little to no training. Disabled children in state care often are excluded from mental healthcare because Medicaid will not pay for therapies specially geared to children with intellectual impairments.

• The state has failed to implement recommendations from prior task forces that studied the deaths of foster children or the use of psychiatric drugs. Indeed, DCF has failed to even assign “responsibility” or “accountability” for implementing such reports.

“Let’s just hope they don’t put this on a shelf and ignore it like all the other reports,” Moore said.

Simular post:

State officials investigating whether 7-year-old suicide victim was given mind-altering drug

URL: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/southflorida/story/1183698.html