'Antipsychotic drugs made me want to kill myself'

'Antipsychotic drugs made me want to kill myself'

This is the really unhelpful and misleading title of an online BBC article reporting a Lancet paper on antipsychotic benefits and problems. The article itself is far more balanced. In fact, it gives a good idea of why so many people with psychotic illness do need to take medication and how much they can be helped by it. You can view it here.



This sort of headline is absolutely the last way to present this kind of complex issue to the general public. The obvious effect will be to discourage people from taking medication or even seeing a doctor in the first place.

I have complained to the BBC about it and it would be helpful if you did too.

Comments

  1. Danny Haszard6 May 2012 at 10:02

    A patient victim speaks.
    The saga of the so called *atypical antipsychotics* is one of incredible profit.Eli Lilly made $65 BILLION on Zyprexa franchise.
    Described as *the most successful drug in the history of neuroscience* the drugs at $12 pill are used by states to medicate deinstitutionalized mental patients to keep them out of the $500 day hospitals (*Viva Zyprexa* Lilly sales rep slogan).
    There is a whole underclass block of our society,including children in foster care that are the market for these drugs,but have little voice of protest if harmed by them.I am an exception,I got diabetes from Zyprexa as an off-label treatment for PTSD and I am not a mentally challenged victim so I post.
    Google-Haszard Zyprexa
    --Daniel Haszard

    ReplyDelete
  2. Dave Curtis6 May 2012 at 11:12

    I've some sympathy with your views but patients with schizophrenia need some kind of medication to keep them well and out of hospital. It's true that Zyprexa has problems but so do all antipsychotics. As the body of the article makes clear, in general and on average the benefits of medication far out-weigh the disadvantages. My objection is that the headline grossly misrepresents the main substance of the piece.

    ReplyDelete

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