Recommended Readings:
Sharna Olfman and Brent Dean Roberts, Editors — Drugging Our Children: How Profiteers Are Pushing Antipsychotics on Our Youngest, and What We Can Do to Stop It
Gwen Olsen contributes Chapter 4 to this anthology entitled “The Marketing of Madness and Psychotropic Drugs to Children”.
Robert Whitaker — Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America
Robert Whitaker — Mad in America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine, and the Enduring Mistreatment of the Mentally Ill.
Robert Whitaker & Lisa Cosgrove – Psychiatry Under the Influence: Institutional Corruption, Social Injury, and Prescriptions for Reform
Ben Lerner, D.C. – The Maximized Living Makeover Manual (Gwen Olsen is a contributing author to this book.)
Dan Yachter, D.C. – Doctor of the Future (Gwen Olsen is a contributing author to this book)
Irving Kirsch, PhD – The Emperor’s New Drugs: Exploding the Antidepressant Myth
Peter Breggin, M.D. – Psychiatric Drug Withdrawal: A Guide for Prescribers, Therapists, Patients and their Families
10 Ways to Reduce Your Family’s RX Drug Risks
1. EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS:
Put prescription drug information on a 3X5 note card and post in medicine cabinet for easy/logical access during emergencies. Be sure to list both the generic and brand name of each drug as well as their dosages. (e.g. Xanax alprazolam .25 mg)
2. OUTDATED MEDICINES:
Dispose of all outdated or left over prescription drugs…properly. DO NOT flush drugs down the toilet as they enter the water supply. Destroy the pills or capsules and throw away residual in the trash for disposal.
3. USE YOUR PRIMARY CARE PROVIDER:
Use your primary care provider as the “gatekeeper” of all prescriptions. DO NOT add drugs to your treatment regimen as prescribed by other specialists without your PCP’s knowledge and review. This can minimize unnecessary drug interactions.
4. A SINGLE PHARMACY:
Fill all of your family’s prescriptions at one local pharmacy. All data will be collected and compared before prescriptions are filled. Again, this can minimize unnecessary drug interactions.
5. LISTEN TO YOUR PHARMACIST:
Always accept the counseling from the pharmacist. Forewarned is forearmed. You should know what to expect when starting a new drug in case of adverse events.
6. WITHDRAWAL EFFECTS:
DO NOT discontinue any drug without consulting your physician. Many drugs can have debilitating—even life threatening—withdrawal effects. NEVER abruptly “cold turkey” off of any psychiatric drug (e.g. antidepressants, antipsychotics, ADHD drugs, mood stabilizers, anxiolytics). These drugs must be carefully tapered down over a period of time under medical supervision.
7. CONTROL ACCESS:
Treat your medicine cabinet like you would a liquor cabinet or a gun cabinet. If there are curious children/teens who could gain access to prescription drugs for abuse, protect them and lock it. Prescription drugs are the most commonly abused drugs of choice in our schools and college campuses nationwide.
8. BE PROACTIVE:
Educate yourself and your children about the dangers of prescription drug use. Knowledge is power. Most of a consumer’s education about their drug use is acquired AFTER an adverse event has occurred.
9. ACTIVATED CHARCOAL:
Keep ACTIVATED CHARCOAL on hand to induce vomiting in the event of an accidental drug overdose or poisoning.
10. ALCOHOL:
DO NOT mix drugs with alcohol or in recreational cocktails as they may potentiate or negate one another (increase or decrease the strength). Drinking and snorting stimulants to bypass their time released mechanism is a dangerous and deadly practice currently used among teens to get high.