HEARING IMPAIRED DAUGHTER WAS MISDIAGNOSED ADHD
Chantal wrote: > I just want to applaud your efforts to end ADHD fraud. > > I fear that many of the doctors and organizations who push for an ADHD diagnosis > of a child are overlooking real problems. I my case, my daughter was diagnosed > as ADHD when she was 3 years old. Yes, she had violent temper tantrums and was > way behind on her speech development. However, the neurologist who looked at > her found no evidence of abnormal brain waves. He put her on Ritalin anyway. > Within a couple of weeks, my daughter became so withdrawn. She wouldn't smile, > didn't want to play, etc. After about a month and a half, I took her off the > stuff and made an appointment with a different doctor. After looking into my > daughter's condition further, she found that my daughter was in fact hearing > impaired, not ADHD. Her temper tantrums were the result of being extremely > frustrated because of the communication road blocks imposed by her hearing > impairment. Likewise, her speech was also affected. > > My daughter is now 10 and is a very happy, normal girl. It didn't take a drug > to make her this way. Rather, a good set of hearing aids and an understanding, > caring speech therapist!
[Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD:
Chantal, thanks for writing and congratulations to you for exemplary parenting. It
is tragic when professionals, surrender their professional ethics and stoop to
decieving the public--their patients, to support themselves in the style to which
they have become accustomed. Here is my letter to the editor, just published in the
May, 2001, journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics--PEDIATRICS. It appears on
page 1239. It's publication had been blocked by members of the AAP committee on
Guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of ADHD, but they, fortunately, were
over-riden by Editor-in-Chief, Jerold F. Lucey, MD.
Here it is.
Jerold F. Lucey, MD, Editor February 1, 2001 PEDIATRICS Editorial Office, Fletcher Allen Health Care, Burlington, VT 05401 Re: Clinical Practice Guideline: Diagnosis and Evaluation of the Child with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactiviity Disorder. Committee on Quality Improvement, Subcommittee on Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. PEDIATRICS. 2000;105:1158- To the Editor, Clinical Practice Guideline opens: "Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder is the most common neurobehavioral disorder of childhood." "Neurobehavioral," implies an abnormality of the brain; a disease. And yet, no confirmatory, diagnostic, abnormality has been found. With six million children said to have it, most of them on addictive, dangerous, stimulants, ambiguity as to the scientific status of ADHD is not acceptable. Goodwin [1], acknowledged the: narrow definition of disease that requires the presence of a biological abnormality. Carey [2] testified at the 1998, Consensus Conference (CC): ” What is now most often described as ADHD in the United States appears to be a set of normal behavioral variations This discrepancy leaves the validity of the construct in doubt ” The CC Panel [3] concluded: “ we do not have an independent, valid test for ADHD, and there are no data to indicate that ADHD is due to a brain malfunction.” * More recently, Castellanos [4], confessed: “Incontrovertible evidence is still lacking!” Where has the notion come from that it is a disease? Carey [2] observed: “ADHD behaviors are assumed to be largely or entirely due to abnormal brain function.” The DSM-IV does not say so, but textbooks and journals do.” If not science, what are textbooks and journals to purvey? Later in the conference, Carey [3] issued the plea: ” we see that the causes of these behaviors called ADHD are entirely speculative. And yet parents and children are being told that these behaviors are due to a brain malfunction. Can you not please strengthen the statement to discourage practitioners from making this statement when there is not adequate proof to support that at this time?” Pearlman [5], wrote: “I take issue with Pincus (DSM-IV Task Force ) assertion that the elimination of the term organic in DSM-IV has served a useful purpose for psychiatry elimination of the term organic conveys the impression that psychiatry wishes to conceal the nonorganic character of many behavioral problems that were, in previous DSM publications, clearly differentiated from known central nervous system diseases.” It is apparent that virtually all professionals of the extended ADHD industry convey to parents, and to the public-at-large, that ADHD is a disease and that children said to have it are diseased-abnormal. This is a perversion of the scientific record and a violation of the informed consent rights of all patients and of the public-at-large. The wording of the AAP Guideline should be changed, forthwith, to reflect the scientific and medical facts of the matter. Sincerely, Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD Fellow, American Academy of Neurology (board certified, N, CN) 1303 Hidden Mountain Drive El Cajon, CA 92019 fred-alden@worldnet.att.net fax 619 442 1932 References 1. Goodwin D. Is Alcoholism Hereditary? Ballantine Books, New York, NY. 1989. 2. Carey, WB. Is Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder a Valid Disorder? Invited presentation to the NIH Consensus Development Conference on ADHD, November 16-18, 1998, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD. 3. NIH Consensus Development Conference on ADHD (transcript), November 16-18, 1998, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD. 4. Pekkanen J. Making Sense of Ritalin (interview of F.X. Castellanos). Readers Digest, January, 2000:159-168. 5. Pearlman T. Clinical Psychiatric News (letters). December, 1994. *This wording appeared in the version of the final statement of the CC Panel distributed at the press conference, the final part of the CC, November, 18, 1998. This wording, which appeared for an indeterminate time on the NIH web site, was subsequently removed and replaced with wording claiming validity for ADHD.
Chantal,
Continue to stand strong for yourself and your family and be wary of those
who come to you and yours in the name of 'help.' I am ashamed of my profession for
having to give such an admonition.
I have heard 'your' story and that of your hearing impaired daughter, many times
over.
Both with and without recognition of their hearing impairment countless numbers are
also victimized with the fraudulent ADHD label and the Ritalin/amphetamine drugging
that automatically, coercively, follows.
Respectfully yours,
Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD