Before You Take That Pill Top 10 Blog Posts for 2009
What a year! Here goes…
DSM V Shadow Team Strikes Back at Psychiatric Establishment on PTSD: My blogs about psychiatry and the DSM were the most controversial but also most read, funny how that goes. In this post I acted like an asshole in criticizing what had been written in the popular press about the process of defining PTSD.
Goodbye to You Too Yaz: That Birth Control Pill is Driving Me Bananas: Bayer spent $20 million for an advertising campaign to reverse the effects of its ad campaign promoting the oral birth control pill, Yaz, as effective for the ups and downs of daily life as well as zits and other skin blemishes. The ads showed women kicking around balloons that said stuff like “mood swings” and “fatigue” while they played the songs “Good bye to You” or “We’re Not Going to Take It.”… too bad the drug can MAKE you depressed…
DSM-V Shadow Team: Retaliations & Beware of Consequences
An article in press in Psychiatric Times which I have posted here has been circulating around that represents a remarkable critique of the process of revising the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-5) by the American Psychiatric Association, Chaired by David Kupfer MD. What’s more chilling is that it is authored by Allen Frances, MD, who chaired the committee to write DSM-4. Dr. Frances comes up with some pretty strong language, e.g.:…
Why I am Not Getting a Flu Shot This Year. Because they don’t work? This one resulted in me having to publicly debate the head of infectious diseases from Emory. Yikes.
Obama Healthcare Plans Unlikely to Get Much Traction: Pretty pessimistic, I know, but born out by the Senate bailing on the public option for healthcare insurance, the only part that mattered. You can read about how the thing went on from there here.
DSM-5 Internet Addiction Disorder? Armaggedon and Manning the Barricades More on DSM and the process of speeding up the writing of the next Bible of Psychiatry.
Are Dermatologists Dippy? The Depressing Accutane Tale Chronicled the history of the coverup of the side effects of the acne medication.
Motherhood is Not a Medical Disorder: Just say no to mandatory screenings of moms for postpartum depression which leads them down the path of antidepressant treatment which can get in their breast milk. This one kicked off a flame war with John Grohol and his site Psych Central
What Ever Happened to Pharmagiles? Turned out he was a comic book author from England.
Taking Ecstasy Not More Dangerous Than Riding a Horse: According to Dr. David Nutt of the UK, anyway. Kicked up quite a fuss with Brit politicians, however.
Grady Hospital Tells Non-citizen Dialysis Patients to Leave or Die. Nice guys! Chronicled our political activism in Atlanta to try not to let the for profit American “model” of healthcare kill people…
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Year End, New Year in Review « The Bitter Pill — January 7, 2010 @ 2:16 pm
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Natural Family Blog » Blog Archive » The Bitter Pill: Year End, New Year in Review by Amy Philo — January 7, 2010 @ 6:05 pm
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By Joe, January 1, 2010 @ 5:55 am
I think that those involved with DSM-V are simply taking to heart the label of the DSM as “psychiatry’s bible.” The bible does not need objective evidence, nor is discussion about the contents open to the masses. It seems obvious that psychiatry is becoming more of a religion whose purpose is to feed money and lives into the gaping maw of big pharma.
By Steve Bremner, January 1, 2010 @ 9:45 pm
What a great year, Doug! Proud of your advocacy and speaking out!