Shortage of ADHD drugs sends parents scrambling

[RamboLiberal]

Source: MSNBC

Nationwide shortages of popular drugs used to treat ADD and ADHD are sending parents scrambling, with some combing multiple pharmacies for the Adderall and Ritalin that keep their kids calm.

Molly Taylor, 46, of Worcester, Mass., was turned away empty-handed this week when she went to pick up prescriptions of Adderall XR for herself and her 16-year-old son, Luke.

“They don’t have them,” an incredulous Taylor told msnbc.com. “You could be waiting several days, which would have a HUGE impact. If you can’t get it that day, it’s very, very difficult.”

In the past two weeks, federal Food and Drug Administration officials added the drugs methylphenidate hydrochloride and amphetamine mixed salts, the generic names for Ritalin and Adderall, to an expanding list of national drug shortages. Some distributors cite manufacturing delays and increased demand as the reasons; others offer no explanation for the shortages.



Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42577775/ns/health-kids_and_parenting/

[aquart]

1. Do any of the ingredients come from Japan?

[virgogal]

2. Very good question---I would never have thought of that.

[aquart]

3. We're going to find disruptions in all sorts of things.

These days that's the first question I'd ask.

[ck4829]

4. Wonder how that happened

[Nihil]

22. Guess they weren't paying enough attention ...

:hide:

[Endangered Specie]

33. I dunno, maybe they ....

look at the kitty!

[targetpractice]

5. It is such a pain to time doctor visits, prescriptions, and availability for these meds.

Once a month I need to go through this song and dance and, plan for the pharmacy need to order stock... Sometimes they will have brand in stock, but not generic or visa versa... Pharmacists won't tell you which they have in stock before prescriptions are written because of the the laws regarding these controlled substances. Stopping stimulant medication for a few days is not the end of the world, but it is a shock to my system... I have a little narcolepsy with my ADD.

[udbcrzy2]

7. We get ours on a 90-day supply through our insurance company's

mail order program. I hate hearing that because we need our meds.

[hedgehog]

6. Yet somehow, meth labs have no problem meeting demand!

[DumpDavisHogg]

8. These drugs destroyed my life

Why these drugs are still popular is anybody's guess.

[tridim]

12. According to my brother's ex-wife..

It's because they get you high as hell. She sold her Ritalin to her classmates.

[notesdev]

9. Just pick up a substitute

You can buy cocaine pretty much everywhere, and it's more healthy for the kids.

[sudopod]

10. Huuuuuurrrrrrrr nt

[TalkingDog]

14. I'd pretty much agree with you there....

but seriously... in the worst of cases (and I've seen a few of them) it really does help. Unfortunately, that's only about 10% of the people taking it.

[notesdev]

15. 10%?

If any more than 1% of the kids taking these drugs are actually helped by them, I'll eat my shorts.

The vast majority of them are due to parents who can't handle their responsibilities, so they drug the kids into submission. Schools don't mind the quieter kids so they assist, even to the point of having school nurses dole out the drugs.

It's "soma" from Brave New World. Unfortunately it means that millions of kids will end up with damaged brain development as a result of this witchcraftery and shamanism that passes for the practice of medicine.

[TalkingDog]

18. Having worked with grade school children for a number of years....

maybe 10% is pushing it, but I know plenty of parents who do everything in their power to make sure their kid is getting the right food, the right environment, the right structure and their kid still has issues.

So I would hesitate to say 1%.

And having been punched (and subsequently bruised) in the solar plexus by a girl no bigger than a stick when she was off schedule with her medication, I'll stand by my assertion that some kids actually need it.

You and I are merely arguing numbers.

[quakerboy]

21. I'm with you.

As someone who first struggled with ADD myself, then learned to more or less live with it, then worked with at risk kids, its challenging but not that hard to see the difference between a poorly parented child and an ADHD sufferer. And working with a group of internationals doing that business, they were all quite clear that the ADHD levels in this country are far higher than in Europe.

That has spawned a theory on my part. I think that ADHD is somewhat adaptive in a less controlled more exploratory setting. Like, for instance, the "new world". I think that the group of humans that came over to the new continent self selected for ADD/ADHD. Without it, less need to get up and go, to leave ones controlled and settled civilized existence. Maybe in a few thousand years, we will have weeded it out, as its no longer so adaptive.

It always makes me a little mad to see the claims that there really aren't any ADHD kids to speak of and the skepticism of the whole thing. As someone who still, as an adult, suffers with this, though without medication now, it also makes me feel just that much more unique.

[meow2u3]

29. My theory of the high ADHD rate in the Americas

People in the Americas are descendants of the explorers, who'd jump out of their skin if they were to stay in their home countries during the Age of Discovery; the immigrants who wouldn't accept their fate of lifelong poverty and misery; and the defectors from dictatorships who wouldn't take shit from dictators micromanaging their everyday lives.
It makes perfect sense that these people who landed in the Western Hemisphere, especially the US, would have traits that would now be called ADHD. I have little doubt they were regarded as "incorrigible" and "unable to sit still" by their families when they were kids.

[Odin2005]

34. +1,000,000

[jberryhill]

11. Sends the kids scrambling too, I'd bet /nt

[liberal N proud]

13. With many kids needing this to get through the day

and if they don't get this, their concentration is diminished, they do poorly in school. This will just add to the image that schools are failing and help drive the kill education efforts by the right.

[naaman fletcher]

19. very few need it to get through the day

It's mostly just parents that don't want to deal with the fact that kids have lots of energy.

[liberal N proud]

23. I thought that too... ONCE!

Until my kid had trouble focusing in school. She was on it did well and we took her off of it for a while and grades went south. She is on adderall and she is pulling A's and B's.

I was totally against drugs and I do know of instance where it was the parent who pushed for these drugs, but I had to be shown that they would work.

[naaman fletcher]

26. interesting..

good to know. are you concerned about any health consequences?

[liberal N proud]

28. As with any long term medication you have to be aware and concerned

[midnight armadillo]

35. ADHD is a neurological disorder

Mocking parents doesn't make it less real. Nor does it necessarily vanish upon adulthood.

Here's a very recent publication: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21183160
also a gene has just been found: http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-04-mutant-gene-linked-adhd.html

[hedgehog]

16. It's possible that some of the kids on Ritalin are actaully sleep deprived:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22881407/ns/health-kids_and_parenting/

[WatsonT]

17. Uh oh, parents may be forced to parent again

rather than drug their spawn in to a stupor.

The horrors.

/yes it is a real disorder and the drugs help . . . the 10% or so who really need it. But for the rest it's a parenting substitute. I wonder if it's a result of people having kids later in life, so they have less energy to deal with a rowdy child? Just a thought.

[Odin2005]

20. Schools should quit pushing meds on kids that don't actually have ADHD.

A good way to test if you actually have ADHD: stimulants like caffeine will, paradoxically, calm you down.

A lot of these kids do NOT have ADHD, they are normal kids stuck behind a desk for hours on end and need to burn off energy.

[jmowreader]

32. You're saying this can be diagnosed at home?

As in, feed the kid about four cups of coffee and watch what happens.

[SlicerDicer-]

24. Thank God!!!

As a person with MASSIVE ADHD... I mean so bad sedatives do not do anything to me.. Coffee knocks me out...

I am glad glad glad people need to learn to control themselfs.. Medicated is not good I am a much more interesting person without the meds and nobody complains. Just learn to control yourself.

[bitchkitty]

27. If you think "just learn to control yourself" is a solution then

you are mistaken - you do not have MASSIVE ADHD.

I wish some of the people in this thread had to live with ADD for one day, or live with a child with ADHD for one day. Then maybe they'd STFU.

[SlicerDicer-]

30. Yeah maybe..

But I can tell you I am a obsessive bastard, I am extremely hyper... But its able to be controlled but hey I have not lived with it my whole life eh? I didn't have a stack of referrals so tall that I had my own filing cabinet.. I didn't get have the cops show up and make me go to court and do community service.. I didn't get finally permanently expelled from school in the 10th grade making me a forced high school drop out. But you know what! I am better for it damn it. I am a independent thinker and I do not put up with bullshit.. I have dyslexia, I have incapability to grasp grammar if you want to blast me on that next have at it boss.

Christ its not easy I know but damn it I had liver damage and thats unacceptable.. I would rather see kids be a bastard than deal with them having damaged livers. I am not a heartless bastard like the republicans that want to medicate everybody into submission.

[hunter]

25. Thriving black market + shortages = PROFIT$$$

For everyone involved but the people who actually need the drugs.

[JosefK]

31. 2nd the view that meds only screw you up more

Having been diagnosed later in life (40s) & doing ok beforehand, I would caution against taking meds if really not needed. Best things to target: 1.) full nights sleep (8 hrs each & every night). 2.) exercise to the point of exhaustion/sweating profusely every day. 3.) do away with cable/dish tv service & minimize use of all electronic screens. If you have ADHD kids, get rid off all your tv's. 4.) eliminate caffeine 5.) diet. Only after you've made those serious changes would I consider meds.

Best book: Gabor Mate's Scattered