Ritalin May Alter Brain Structure

	posted by Scott on Wednesday November 21, @12:36PM from the boys/young-men dept.
	In a disturbing article from Australia's Herald Sun, it is revealed that a recent Buffalo University study has found that Ritalin, the most popular drug for treating ADD/ADHD, may cause long term brain damage. "The changes look similar to those with stimulants such as amphetamine and cocaine...One of the genes [modified by large amounts of amphetamine and cocaine] has been linked with addiction when it is activated in certain parts of the brain."

	Source: The Herald Sun [Australian newspaper] Title: ADD drug may change brain Author: Unknown Date: November 13, 2001

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Serious issues, larger implications by Lorianne on Wednesday November 21, @08:23PM EST (#1) (User #349 Info) This is a topic I feel very strongly about. Although statistics claim more boys than girls are prescribed Ritalin the fact remains that this drug is dangerous to both. Also, Ritalin is not the only drug therapy prescribed to children. i know, I've been fighting this battle with schools pushing drugs on my daughter for years (I've resisted). I also know of other girls and boys on other drugs basically to counter social "disorders". Attention deficit is only one, the most well known, part of the overall trend to medicate kids for all kinds of things. The larger implications are that schools want to use drugs to "socialize" kids. My daughter has an opposite problem from "attention deficit". She has focusses "too much" on individual school tasks and does not "transition" well from activity to activity. Schoolspeak for she doesn't follow the program and is not on a 20 minute attention span cycle geared towards kids who can't concentrate on a task longer than that. The verdict, once again, drugs. The larger implications is that differences in learning styles and attention spans won't/can't be accomodated in current school ideology (not to mention 30+:1 student/teacher ratio). The answer, don't change education, don't reduce class size, drug kids. This new research is frightening. I have the will and determination to keep the drug pushers at bay, but how many parents don't?

Re:Serious issues, larger implications by Nightmist (nightmist@mensactivism.org) on Wednesday November 21, @08:41PM EST (#2) (User #187 Info) http://www.jameshanbackjr.com This new research is frightening. I have the will and determination to keep the drug pushers at bay, but how many parents don't? You make certain you lead by example on this one. Let other parents know about the problems with prescribing their children drugs like Ritalin. Bring it up at parent-teacher meetings. I daydreamed my way through school, largely because I was unchallenged and bored stiff. Things moved too slow for me there. As a result, I received mediocre grades until high school and college. Fortunately for me, they weren't drugging kids then. I'm sure things would've turned out for the worse for me if they had.

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