Too many Americans can’t afford to and simply do not–take their medicines as prescribed. That estimate is based on information from the (American!) Centers for Disease Control). I have had patients come into my office who take their medications –in both cases, for life-threatening infectious diseases — only every other day, simply because that is all they can afford. I explained to each one individually the idea of the half-life of a drug. They only stay in your body for a certain length of time, then they leave your body in waste products. That is why taking a drug every other day is not really effective. They both gave me almost exactly the same response — It was all they could afford, and it was probably better than nothing. Read more on Big Pharma Is Capitalism Out Of Control…
Filed under Alternative Medicine, Diagnosis, Disease, Doctors, Education, Government, Hepatitis C, medicine, News, politics, prescription drugs, Psychiatrists, Psychotherapy by on May 29th, 2017. Comment. 
Chantix is a prescription smoking-cessation aid and has a lovely official website that will give you the information about the drug that the company that makes it provides for patients. This is the package insert a doctor is supposed to read before prescribing. You will love paragraph 6, about neuropsychiatric side effects. Read more on Drug Companies HAVE To Tell You The Bad News…
Filed under News, prescription drugs by on May 27th, 2017. Comment.
It is only a dim memory for me. Sitting around the black and white television with my folks, watching Alfred Hitchcock walk into his profile, and say things to America in a snarky sort of tone that I could never have used with anybody. Strange, I don’t remember the content of she shows. Not too surprising — I was only two years old when he came on the air. Read more on Was Alfred Hitchcock the best pharmaceutical rep ever?…
Filed under Alternative Medicine, News, prescription drugs by on May 26th, 2017. Comment.
Okay, those lovable folks at Purdue Pharmaceutical decided to claim that Oxycontin, one of the favorite drugs at least of the street addicts I have seen and treated at an addiction center, is less “addictive” and less “abusable” than similar drugs.
Filed under Addictions, Alternative Medicine, big pharma, FDA, Government, News, prescription drugs, Substance Abuse by on May 25th, 2017. Comment.
The lyrics start:
Filed under Alternative Medicine, Doctors, medicine, News, Research by on May 23rd, 2017. Comment.
While I was training in psychiatry 30 years ago, the field was changing around me. The older psychoanalysts were forced — reluctantly — to add prescription of psychotropics to their practices or else patients would never make it to their door. Of course, they had little to no training in pharmacology and less interest so they didn’t usually know what they were doing. While I was ascending in the ranks of psychiatric trainees, the best and the brightest of us were ushered into special training in pharmacology research. I was (and probably still am) about as idealist and apolitical an up-and-coming psychiatrist that anyone could have invented. Read more on The Politics of Drug Development…
Filed under politics, prescription drugs, Psychiatrists, Uncategorized by on May 20th, 2017. Comment.
Filed under medicine, News, Research by on May 18th, 2017. Comment.
My favorite way to put people to sleep is Aromatherapy. To help a person sleep, the requisite molecules have to get to the brain. They certainly to not have to drag around the circulation of the entire body. The sense of smell is perhaps the most sensitive of all senses. You need to smell only a few molecules of something, compared to how much it takes to see and hear, they say. I have heard it said many times, although it does sound a bit like comparing apples and oranges. Read more on A Sweet Way To Go To Sleep…
Filed under Alternative Medicine, Brain, News, prescription drugs by on May 13th, 2017. Comment.
Sleep is a complex function. it is not just biological, but also psychological and social. Your “daily residue;” everything that happened at work or whatever that day, combines with past traumas (which may have been dragged around since childhood) to create what may be disturbing dreams. Read more on Ways I Get Patients Off Of Sleeping Pills…
Filed under News, Research, Sleep by on May 12th, 2017. Comment.
I have been worrying about patients taking them, literally, for years and years. I remember one of those studies that they release to the media. It happened shortly after we moved to the San Diego area about 2004 when I heard on the radio that people who used prescription sleeping pills just did not live as long as people who did not. Read more on Sleeping Pills Are Not The Best Things For Sleep…
Filed under prescription drugs, Psychiatrists by on May 11th, 2017. Comment.