An Informed Parent,.. is a Child’s best advocate.

Although I agree with it in principle, in reality most people probably will not take the time to read the documentation. It will likely be several pages at least. This is especially true when the medication is being provided to someone truely sick — I’m not going to take the time to sit in my hospital bed and read the “informed consent” documentation about the anethesia, antibiotics, and muscle relaxants being administered to me prior to my surgery. I’m going to trust the doctor to make the best decision he or she can. In that light, can “informed consent” really work? Maybe in the case of pysciatric drugs, lifestyle drugs, and cardiovascular drugs. But in most other markets, it just doesn’t seem practical.

The Industry has been absolved of all Lawsuits since FDA placed a Black Box Warning on antidepressants. The issue before us, is that Physicians and Special Interest Groups are lobbying our State Officials to prevent a Parent’s right to make an informed medical decision on behalf of their child.

Its hard to comprehend why these individuals would want to place a child or their the family in harms way.

CT Mental Health Transformation Grant to pay for Party, while suicides continue to take place in facilities.

CT is one of 9 States to receive a portion of a $95 million dollar Grant funded by the American people to transform the Mental Health System. Ablechild participated in this grant by attending several mental health transformation meetings, and brought vital data to the committee relating to the dangers associated with psychiatric drugs being given to children. The FDA has placed a black box warning on antidepressants relating to increased risk of suicide.

Ablechild requested that all Grant Committee meetings have a stenographer present to ensure accountability to the taxpayers on what reforms would be put in place on informed consent and the right to refuse psychiatric services. Ablechild wanted the citizens of CT to know how the money would be spent and to achieve meaningful mental health reforms.

It is with great disappointment that our request for a stenographer was denied. Yale University took the minutes and is a State Vendor that will receive these grant funds.

In addition, ablechild just received an invitation to a party for all participants of the mental health transformation grant to be held at a Country Club here in CT. This party will be paid for by the mental health transformation grant. Meanwhile, another suicide of a 17 year old has been reported within a facility here in Connecticut. Ablechild is waiting for toxicology report to see if this child was receiving mental health treatment.

Ablechild is outraged that this grant will fund a lavish party for State employees and vested parties who are receiving these grant funds. Meanwhile, lawmakers continue to pass laws for more forced psychiatric treatments as basic informed consent and the right to refuse psychiatric treatments are pushed away as radical ideas.

Ablechild is currently in the process of placing a human rights watch on a young boy who was previously in the care of the State of Connecticut and was forced drugged with psychiatric drugs and abused within the facility. This single mother was coerced into placing her son into the care of the State while she was tending to her daughter who was in a car crash. She trusted the State to provide her son with mental health assistance.

When that boy returned home to her he was in worse shape than when he went in. He is now facing a 9 month plea sentence for larceny a crime he pled not guilty to when he was just 16. He is now 18 and graduates from High School on January 31, 2008 and has been accepted to Baron Institute of Technology. He is going into the same facility where a boy 17 just hung himself. Ablechild is writing a friend of the court letter to the judge asking for a Human Rights Watch to be placed on him. Our request is to provide this boy with a journal and access to non-psychiatric educational services. This facility has a shortage of educational resources for the inmates and they are in lock down most of the time. It is overcrowded with little State oversight.

While society might want to say throw these kids away, we must deal with these boys when they are released as men, what happens to these children within these facilities should be of concern to all of us. As we learned from the tragic Cheshire killings, mental health treatment facilities can be breeding grounds for those mandated into failed treatments such as psychiatric drug use and electric shock treatments. It is time we hold these mental health vendors accountable for the millions of dollars they are receiving and the failed and often deadly services they are pushing. It is time for the State to stop bending at the knee to the will of the mental health industry and starting looking out for the mental health clients. Open up choice within the mental health industry.
http://www.ablechild.org

“Informed consent” should be designed to protect both the patient AND the drug company.

Bob and I have strikingly similar methods of debate, how funny is that!!