More than one in four American women took at least one drug for conditions like anxiety and depression last year, according to an analysis of prescription data.
The report, by pharmacy benefits manager Medco Health Solutions Inc, found the use of drugs for psychiatric and behavioral disorders in all adults rose 22per cent from 2001. The medications are most often prescribed to women aged 45 and older, but their use among men and in younger adults climbed sharply.
In total, more than 20per cent of American adults were found to be on at least one drug for mental health disorders. A number of celebrities have gone public in recent years with their battles with mental health disorders. In adults 20 to 44, use of antipsychotic drugs and treatments for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) more than tripled, while use of anti-anxiety drugs like Xanax, Valium and Ativan rose 30per cent from a decade ago.
On the rise: A bar graph showing the increase in the number of Americans using mental health medication between 2001 and 2010. There are considerably more women doing so than men
The statistics were taken from Medco's database of prescriptions and is based on 2.5million patients with 24 months of continuous prescription drug insurance and eligibility. The company said women are twice as likely as men to use anxiety treatments as 11per cent of women 45 to 65 are on an anxiety medication. Women are also more likely than men to take antipsychotic drugs like Zyprexa, Risperdal, and Abilify, which treat disorders like bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
However, among men 20 to 64, use of the drugs has quadrupled over the last decade.
Dr David Muzina, a psychiatrist and national practice leader of Medco's Neuroscience Therapeutic Resource Center, said: 'There has been a significant uptick in the use of medications to treat a variety of mental health problems. 'What is not as clear is if more people — especially women - are actually developing psychological disorders that require treatment. 'Or (it might be) if they are more willing to seek out help and clinicians are better at diagnosing these conditions than they once were.'
Pharmaceutical companies have also sought and received approvals to market their drugs to larger groups of people. Drugs for ADHD, which Olympic gold medal swimmer Michael Phelps was diagnosed with when he was nine, are prescribed to boys more often than girls, but adult women now take the drugs more often than men. ADHD prescriptions to adult women grew 2.5 times from 2001. However, ADHD prescriptions for children have been declining since 2005.
That reflects a decline in prescriptions for psychiatric and behavioral drugs for children.
Worrying trend: There has been a sharp rise in the the percentage of Americans aged between 20 and 44 taking ADHD medication since 2001 Medco found that prescriptions of those drugs for children have dropped since 2004, when the FDA warned they were linked to suicidal thoughts when used in people under 19. The company said less than 1per cent of children use antipsychotics drugs, although the figure has doubled since 2001. In the 'diabetes belt' states of Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi and Alabama, about 23per cent of people are on at least one psychiatric or behavioral disorder drug. Diabetes is particularly widespread in those states and the condition is associated with higher levels of depression and anxiety disorders. The lowest rate of prescriptions was found in Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Michigan, where less than 15 per cent of people are using those medications.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z1e1CQmksu
You're all mad!
You're all mad!
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”
Re: You're all mad!
Don't forget Pennsylvania where the incidence of Diabetes, especially Western Pa., has increased in children in the last 10 years.
I expect to go straight to hell...........at least I won't have to spend time making new friends.
Re: You're all mad!
Blame it on the Corn lobby...
Sometimes it seems as though one has to cross the line just to figger out where it is
Re: You're all mad!
Can we trust this information? 1:4 seems hellish high.
I actually would like to know rubato's thoughts on this. (Now there's something you didn't think you'd read!)
I actually would like to know rubato's thoughts on this. (Now there's something you didn't think you'd read!)
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”
Re: You're all mad!
Follow the $$$$.
Your collective inability to acknowledge this obvious truth makes you all look like fools.
yrs,
rubato
Re: You're all mad!
Well, there's a war on, that could have something to do with it. The troops coming home get meds. The families of those serving overseas take meds. Anybody who's been through one of our many disasters in the past ten years, usually gets perscribed meds. It's a common treatment tool for stress syndromes.
Re: You're all mad!
I'd like a little more granularity in the data before making any conclusions. 1 in 4 filled a prescription for such drugs in a year. How many were taken? For how long? And a little more detail about the reasons. My carpool partner has a fear of public speaking and once a year she has a high-stress FDA audit for a period from 3 - 10 days. The anti-anxiety drug (according to her) is miraculously effective but she never takes it any other time. Without the meds she has what sounds like a borderline panic attack where she has trouble functioning. How many of those pills are taken?
So I don't know what it means.
yrs,
rubato
So I don't know what it means.
yrs,
rubato
Re: You're all mad!
People these days think that not being happy is abnormanl, so they take happy pills if they are not. No more complicated than that.
I don't give a damn for a man that can only spell a word one way. Mark Twain
Re: You're all mad!
Thank God for these pills. I know a couple relatives whose lives literally turned around whenthey were prescribed anti-depressants. They transformed people who were miserable all the time (and tended to make everyone around them miserable) into rather pleasant people.
OTOH, I have a nephew who has had some serious run-ins with the Law because of the combination of his anti-depressants and alcohol (he is an idiot). He becomes extremely aggressive on the combination, which is not his norm.
1 in 4 American women? My guess is that those actually taking the drugs regularly is a fraction of that.
OTOH, I have a nephew who has had some serious run-ins with the Law because of the combination of his anti-depressants and alcohol (he is an idiot). He becomes extremely aggressive on the combination, which is not his norm.
1 in 4 American women? My guess is that those actually taking the drugs regularly is a fraction of that.
Re: You're all mad!
liberty1 wrote:People these days think that not being happy is abnormanl, so they take happy pills if they are not. No more complicated than that.
They (antidepressants) aren't "happy pills", they relieve the intense godwaful suffering of depression.
Depression is a mood disorder brought about by a chemical imbalance in the brain.
It's a real bitch to deal with both for the mental health professional and the patient.
For my own-ongoing state of melancholy, I recently discovered this site which views depression from a Jungian stance: http://www.cgjungpage.org/index.php?opt ... &Itemid=40
Darkness descends without call. Unlike the predictable occurrence of night, this darkness comes whenever it wants, and does not leave at a foreseen time. This unpredictable and chaotic nature of the dark mood enhances its depth of being. With darkness comes loneliness, an isolation that seems unbearable. Looking out into the world, but feeling separated from the experience of this world. Feeling the frustration of isolation, which enhances the malady of being unable to reach out and communicate to others. This ‘illness’ creates a glass cage for the subject, where you look, but cannot touch or be touched. Depression is experienced as a ‘lack of’. A lack of relating to others, a lack of feeling in touch with oneself, the absence of feeling loved and being able to love, an absence of hope, and these absences, which feed the depression and make recovery seem so distant.
<snip>
Your collective inability to acknowledge this obvious truth makes you all look like fools.
yrs,
rubato
Re: You're all mad!
1 in 4 women seems about right to me. It's really being pushed by the pharmaceutical companies. If you watch tv, you'll see lots of commercials for those pills.
The fun part is listening to all of the potential side effects.
Suicidal thoughts, muscle pain, dry mouth, dizziness, weight gain or loss, death, to name a few...
The fun part is listening to all of the potential side effects.
Suicidal thoughts, muscle pain, dry mouth, dizziness, weight gain or loss, death, to name a few...
Re: You're all mad!
I know all about it Dales, and I know many people need them. My wife has OCD and was diagnosed with and prescribed every myriad of things before she found a great behaivoral psychiatrist.
But they are way, way over prescribed.
But they are way, way over prescribed.
I don't give a damn for a man that can only spell a word one way. Mark Twain
Re: You're all mad!
Liberty, thanks for your candor, can I ask what she was prescribed for her OCD? Just out of professional curiosity.
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”
Re: You're all mad!
She tried all kinds of different things, I can't remember them all. I know the last thing she took was a cocktail of 3 different things, efexor (sp?) was one of them, as well as ritalin and something else that I think started with a C, but just can't remember it right now, I remeber it was a orangish/tan tablet.
She has managed it herself for several years now. The first thing that helped her was a book called "Brain Lock" which described the learning mechanism in the brain that causes thoughts to get's stuck, then she found a great psychiatrist that helped with the meds initially and with behaivor modifications.
OCD is a strange condition that seems to affect very smart and creative people. She is one of the most intelligent people I've ever met (and I work with lots of PhDs), her main issue was finding someone she couldn't out smart.
She has managed it herself for several years now. The first thing that helped her was a book called "Brain Lock" which described the learning mechanism in the brain that causes thoughts to get's stuck, then she found a great psychiatrist that helped with the meds initially and with behaivor modifications.
OCD is a strange condition that seems to affect very smart and creative people. She is one of the most intelligent people I've ever met (and I work with lots of PhDs), her main issue was finding someone she couldn't out smart.
I don't give a damn for a man that can only spell a word one way. Mark Twain
Re: You're all mad!
Thanks Efexxor is a mood stabiliser/anti-depressant, much used in OCD. Ritalin is an amphetamine analogue, much used with kids not so much with adults, and highly risky. Mixing it with Effexxor is counter intuitive, but I'm sure the consultant was better placed than I am to decide. The C? Cipramil perhaps? Another anti-depressant (SSRI.)
I'm so glad to hear that your wife has responded well to behavioural techniques, I wouldn't wish that cocktail of drugs on my worse enemy!
I'm so glad to hear that your wife has responded well to behavioural techniques, I wouldn't wish that cocktail of drugs on my worse enemy!
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”
Re: You're all mad!
I have a third possibility...What is not as clear is if more people — especially women - are actually developing psychological disorders that require treatment. 'Or (it might be) if they are more willing to seek out help and clinicians are better at diagnosing these conditions than they once were.'
The massive TV advertising campaigns for these drugs (something that didn't exist at all a few years ago) has created a market and demand for them just like for antacids and breath mints. It's changed millions of folks from people who in the past would rely on the diagnosis of their doctor for the prescription of anti-depressants into commercial driven consumers of them who go to their doctors seeking them out the same way they would go to a grocery store manager asking them to start stocking a particular brand of soda that was attractively advertised on the tube.
Re: You're all mad!
Concerta was what I was thinking of, I believe that is time released ritalin, obviously a high strung high energy personality. This did help "slow her down" even though that is coubnter intuitive as well.
Just can't think of the third.
Just can't think of the third.
I don't give a damn for a man that can only spell a word one way. Mark Twain
Re: You're all mad!
It's probably a combination of all of the above. Not to mention, the stigma of taking anti-depressants and anti-anxiety meds is finally falling to the side. Back when I was in law school and preparing the take the bar exam, several states and DC required that bar applicants disclose whether they had been in therapy or taken medications for depression. It was finally stopped in DC after a law suit found it discriminatory, and I think other states dropped it as well. I don't think it was on the Massachusetts application.
BTW, that opening statement can't be correct. Is Medco trying to extrapolate from their client base to the entire US population? Given the number who don't have health insurance, or prescription benefits, I'd bet the total ratio is far lower. Perhaps the sentence should read: 1 in 4 American women who have a good health insurance plan took at least one drug for anxiety or depression last year.
BTW, that opening statement can't be correct. Is Medco trying to extrapolate from their client base to the entire US population? Given the number who don't have health insurance, or prescription benefits, I'd bet the total ratio is far lower. Perhaps the sentence should read: 1 in 4 American women who have a good health insurance plan took at least one drug for anxiety or depression last year.
“I ask no favor for my sex. All I ask of our brethren is that they take their feet off our necks.” ~ Ruth Bader Ginsburg, paraphrasing Sarah Moore Grimké
Re: You're all mad!
Liberty1 wrote:Concerta was what I was thinking of, I believe that is time released ritalin, obviously a high strung high energy personality. This did help "slow her down" even though that is coubnter intuitive as well.
Just can't think of the third.
There's a rule of thumb which say that 3 psycho-active drugs in combination is not a good thing. It makes it very difficult to determine which is have the beneficial effect, also the side effect profile tends to rise rapidly with three. Its not hard and fast rule by any means, at least one of our kids is on three. Though from what you are saying it sounds like two forms of ritalin (Methylphenidate) were being used alongside Effexor.
BTW is Effexor XR licensed and used in the USA? We're seeing some good effects from it with our mood-disordered kids.
As to the OP, I think there have been several good points being made here.
Jim, we have had a number of kids/parents who have heard (but not seen advertised) "good things about drug X, can you prescribe that for me?" To which the answer is normally along the lines of ;' "Come back and talk to me about it after you've done your first four years in medical college."
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”