Saturday, May 21, 2011

Old School Medicine

Back when I was a kid there was no such thing as ADHD.

I've always been suspicious that the ever increasing levels of ADHD diagnoses were created to create more psychiatric positions, generate pharmaceutical company profits, or to justify poor parenting skills. It's easy to blame a disease or disorder.

In many of these cases a child's behavior can be attributed to just "kids being kids". It's normal for kids have short attention spans and lots of energy. Think back to your own childhood. If any of us got out of line or didn't pay attention, it wasn't because we had a psychiatric disorder, we were just impulsively acting our age.

If our behaviors got out of line, no big deal. Our parents and teachers prescribed their own treatments for hyperactivity. These treatments seemed to work, and they didn't require a trip to the doctor and prescription for pills. We turned out okay, right?

Maybe we need to reassess some of that old school medicine. What do you think?


Meet Doctor Shay from Kranky Kritik on Vimeo.

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