Tag Archives: bipolar

Wholesale sedation of young children medically, morally indefensible

The twin murder trials of the parents of Rebecca Riley, who died at age 4 of an overdose of the psychiatric drug, clonidine, have cast a spotlight on the beliefs and practices of the doctor who prescribed the drug. Kayoko Kifuji was granted immunity in both trials in exchange for her cooperation for testifying. Reactions from jurors, comments online and letters to the editor based on newspaper accounts of Kifuji’s testimony range from confusion, shock, and outrage directed at the doctor’s role in the tragedy.

After $1.4 billion criminal fine for illegal marketing, Eli Lilly tries something new—promoting “ethical behavior”

Eli Lilly and Co. has agreed to add four new senior positions to “promote highly ethical and compliant behaviors” as part of a settlement of two lawsuits arising from the company’s illegal marketing and promotion of several drugs.

Drug Giant AstraZeneca to drop psychiatric drug research for schizophrenia, bipolar, depression & anxiety drugs

AstraZeneca is to stop researching some disease areas that form the backbone of its current business — including schizophrenia and acid reflux — in a drive to focus R&D efforts and cut costs.

Kickbackers’ motto: ‘Do no harm’ (to profits)—How drug company used kickbacks to get patients on psych drugs

TALK ABOUT death panels. The US attorney in Boston recently filed suit against the world’s largest maker of health products, Johnson & Johnson, for using kickbacks to get more nursing home patients onto its drugs, including one that was later found to be so lethal to the elderly it had to carry a black-box warning. The government’s complaint leaves little doubt that the drug company acted in a predatory way to increase sales and market share for its products, especially Risperdal, an antipsychotic often used to keep Alzheimer’s and dementia patients under control.

Cooking the Books:The statistical games behind “off-label” prescription drug use

Study patients took the anti-seizure drug Neurontin, and researchers measured tons of possible outcomes (like pain with touch, pain with cold, excessive pain with pinpricks, more than a dozen different scales for psychiatric symptoms, and so on). By random chance, if you measure enough outcomes, at least some of them will appear better after drug treatment. When the time came to report the findings, however, the researchers systematically omitted the outcomes on which the drug had no effect—and presented only the data showing benefit. That’s like dealing dozens of hands of poker to yourself but showing only the hand with good cards.