Dear FRONTLINE,

Great program. I do think that something is going on, and in no way am I trying to simplify the matter but ... I couldn't help but think that nobody was talking about diet, exercise, life style, and just the plain old fashioned use of tough love to motivate and guide children in ways that are necessary but uncomfortable. My guess is that if energy was focused in these areas there would be a better chance of pin-pointing what really is or is not going on.

Michael Beckworth
Seattle, WA

Dear FRONTLINE,

I have mixed feelings about this program. As a Naturopathic Physician I completely agree that children with bipolar disorder and other psychiatric disorders are being over-medicated. I also believe that this program is utterly neglectful in not mentioning the importance of a healthy diet. There are a myriad of studies that link the consumption of omega-3 fatty acids and other aspects of a healthy diet to mental health. You have totally missed out on a wonderful opportunity to help many parents make a huge difference for the life of their child. One therapist was even asked outright by a mother if she was doing everything for her son and the therapist said that his treatment at this time was 99% pharmaceutical. This is ludicrous! There are so many natural health care providers who are making a difference for children with bipolar disorder. It's a shame not one of them was consulted for this program.

Erica Peirson
Portland, Oregon

Dear FRONTLINE,

As a person with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, secondary to domestic violence, I have been misdiagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. The diagnosis is dead wrong, and I have been experimented on with the same meds that these children are being destroyed with. Risperdal, Geodon, Clonidine, Trazadone, Lamictal, Abilify, Seroquel, and the entire spectrum of psychiatric drugs are a distinct danger to adults, they have NO reason be allowed to be prescribed for children. The doctors who are engaging in this practice should be considered criminals, and should be handled as such. Never forget that doctors PRACTICE medicine, don't let them practice on you or your children.

Noa Stark
Eugene, OR

Dear FRONTLINE,

From the time our daughter was born we knew something was not right. This was in 1988. The doctors could not tell us anything. She was a baby. As she got older it became obvious and apparent she had a problem. We still could not get a doctor to help. Our daughter was going from one extreme to the other, sometimes in a matter of minutes. When she was manic she couldn't stop talking or sit still and her language was very inappropriate. When she was depressed she became very destructive and aggresive. We were made to wait until she started school and get a report from the school. Eventually, we did get referred to a psychiatrist. I think she was about ten years old. She (and her mother and I) suffered with a doc who didn't really seem to know how to treat her. He kept changing the dosages of her meds and adding new ones and taking her off of some. In the end she was taking four meds. We decided to see another doc. He was flabbergasted at all the meds she was taking and why the other doc prescribed them. She was taking a mood stabilizer, anti-anxiety and anti-depressants and a sedative to help her sleep. She was weened off the anti's and ramped up on the mood stabilizer. The difference was like night and day. As for the sedative, it turns out she has diabetes insipetis and was up all night going to the bathroom. No more sedative. She was given a med for that. Today she is doing great at age 21 and is off all her meds. She still has an occasional manic episode but she can identify it and will remove herself from any potentially bad situation.

Hilliard, Ohio

Dear FRONTLINE,

The show made a big mistake in not comparing the diagnosis and treatment of childhood psychiatric disorder in the US versus other developed countries. Dr. Chang answered this in your FAQ by making the typical American medical establishment argument: we do things better here than elsewhere. The truth is that we make more money by "diagnosing" and treating these problems than other developed countries! Please do a follow-up show comparing countries.

Rick Dennstedt, MD
Flagstaff, AZ

Dear FRONTLINE,

I was very intrigued by this program. Being a physical education teacher, I was not alarmed that no doctors interviewed on the show, or no mention from any person on the show, that exercise could be a possible path for improvement in mental/emotional disfunction. I know that there is plenty of research on exercise (steady state moderate to high intensity) and the improved function of the brain in the young and the old. You would think that of all the therapies to try, that an exercise program would be utilized first. I think this would have been a very useful angle to have explored.

Lerry Pollock
Palatine, IL

Dear FRONTLINE,

Frontline - I am so glad that you had this show on. I am 45 years old and suffer from Bi-polar. I never knew that I had a mental illness when I was a child. I enlisted into the Marine Corps and was trained as an infentray soilder and this is when my biggest problems began. I was discharged and for 15 years suffered severly from this disorder. I have lived a life that no one would ever want to experiance. After almost killing my brother I went to a psychologist - I was told I had bi-polar and PTSD. Please if anyone thinks that their child might have bi-polar have them checked for it. I lost half of my life to this illness and my family had to witness the events including attempting suicide. Life is a little better with meds, but not normal and it's not going to get any better. To Sue Smith life with bi-polar is a terrible life to live.

Joseph Wozniak
Harrison Twp., Michigan

Dear FRONTLINE,

When I was a little girl of about six, my parents often observed my rapid mood swings from laughter to tears. When I was in my twenties, I began having episodes of hysteria alternating with depression. Some psychiatrists thought I was bi-polar. There weren't the meds available then that there are today, so I was put on "mood elevators" like Librium and tranqulizers like Valium. This was in the early 1970s. Later in that decade as the symptoms continued, a doctor tried me on Lithium, but I had an adverse reaction and it was quickly discontinuted. Psychiatrists were baffled. I was struggling to function. By 1977 I was said to be both socially and vocationally incapacitated and "leading a dull, grim, lonely, cramped existence with no friends." Today I am a highly functioning 59-year-old taking 75mg of Effexor a day. I appeared to be bi-polar when the more accurate diagnosis I received later was Borderline Personality Disorder. The cause, however, was almost total invalidation in my earliest formative years and a great deal of sexual and verbal abuse that went undetected for many years. How can a child control emotions that are denied, made to seem to be other than what they are and all that rage and pain has to be redirected deep within where it comes out in ways that baffle the best of the experts? Children today deal with a great deal of stress and pressure from peers and society's expectations regardless of where they live, and I think this contributes to some twisted responses within them. I had no way to express or even understand things happening to me that were way beyond my years. I've had over 30 years of therapy to come this far and lots of help from God too. I hope this gives hope to those struggling with the confusion of dealing with a baffling child's symptoms and behavior. Today my emotions are fully integrated, I've recovered from the pain and trauma of my early years and it is my hope to encourage others.

Merica St.John
Saint Paul, Minnesota

Dear FRONTLINE,

I am almost speechless. Thank You for This Tv Show! With a GrandChild having numerous "guesses" from as many doctors and no real "Diagnosis" and being prescribed even more Medicine, We needed to hear We are not alone!! I am going to read more from Other Families and Will write again another time! Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!

Concerned Nana
mpls, mn

Dear FRONTLINE,

I am no doctor..But if the brain is not fully funcunal until one becomes an Adult then all these drugs Children are givin would seem to me alter thier brain. I think School teachers and Parents find it convienent to use drugs to control a child. While I was growing up I never met a kid that had AHAD or Bipolar..If a kid was unruly they where spanked..Seemed to work very well in calming them down. Kids are full of energy get bored easily and hate school. Perhaps kids need to be outside working off that energy, spend time in the woods and fields, use their minds to focus on creating things.

Doctors are pushers for the drug companys and there is no drug created by man that does not have at least one side effect. If you feel a kid actualy does have a problem perhaps relaxation and meditation and a little effort on the parents part would go a long way. Everybody develops differently some slower then others. I think what I saw on your show is criminal and a form of child abuse.

Terry Miller
Orrville, Ohio

Dear FRONTLINE,

My best wishes go out to the families that you presented in your program. It is a difficult road to follow for the parents and their child. My son was diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder around the age of 10. His grandfather had it too. He's now a vibrant young adult. Although I know my son will most likely be on medication for rest of his life, there were issues with the treatments at different times. The higher doses of antidepressants can have unexpected side effects and interactions with other medications and even foods.

At some point I found out that there wasn't much data about children on these meds in the first place and that really concerned me. He was first placed on Luvox and when the dosage was increased, I believe to 200 mg, he experienced extreme fits of anger. The doctor didn't think it was due to the medication and my son felt uncomfortable discussing the problem with the doctor. There was discussion about additional disorders and other meds! The anger symptoms magically disappeared when he was switched to another drug Paxil for healthplan reasons! He recently had to switch off of Paxil to something else because it started causing extreme fatigue.

Sometimes the professionals also forget that a child may not open up to a therapist if they aren't a good fit for that child. When he was 12 or13, his therapist suggested a misdiagnosis of aspberger's syndrome in addition to OCD since he felt uncomfortable talking to her; he would just sit there and not answer her. A friend from out-of-town who was a child psychologist knew my son socially; she suggested that we switch therapists as soon as possible. She said there was no way that he had aspberger"s!

My advice to other parents with children dealing with these issues is this: Be your child's best advocate. Remember to try to find out as much information that is out there about the medications. Network with other parents that have children with the same problem if you can. Trust your gut feelings if something doesn't seem right; I was suspicious when some med was suggested to be added for every little problem we encoutered. I don't think the "medication cocktail mix" is the solution; then it's hard to tell what's causing side effects. My son's life is so much better due to the relief of symptoms from the medication, but it's still a balancing act!

Karen Sciole
Reading, PA

Dear FRONTLINE,

Frontline got it right, and also missed an important point. Where Frontline got it right: In my work as a counselor of children I would have to say that the majority of the children I have seen have been brought to treatement for behavior problems in the home or in the classroom. (Often we don't see a child's inner suffering until they bother us.) While a few of these children were exhibiting behaviors that could be described as bizarre and indicative of some real pathology, most of these kids are just exhibiting behaviors that are either out-of-sync with their chronological age, or are extreme expressions of behaviors that are developmentally normal. The difficulty these children present their parents is very real and is to be taken seriously. However, I believe that many people in the environments in which the child and family are trying to function are not willing to tolerate, make adjustments for, the needs of these children and their families. The easy availablity of drugs to control behavior, combined with our societal tendency toward intolerance of difficult and inconvenient behaviors, has contributed to this overuse of medication. While there are, sadly, children who do truly seem to have bipolar disorder (the young lady on Frontline may be an example), far too many children are being put on potent chemical cocktails as the only way to address their needs. Here's where Frontline missed a step: thorough evaluation is always needed before prescribing these medications. An exhaustive social history is a must -- sometimes a child's agitated, bizarre or moody behavior can be connected with a trauma history. A neuropsychological evaluation may be helpful, and a neurologic exam. In the case of one child I worked with a thorough evaluation revealed that his functioning and symptoms placed him on the Autism spectrum. Counseling (of the child and for support of the parents), behavioral therapy and much more support of these children's individual needs in the schools needs to be a part of an holistic approach. Maybe Frontline can do a follow-up on some innovative child and family therapy approaches going on in this country and around the world. See The Beyond Consequences Institute, The Theraplay Institute, ATTaCh, Dr. Daniel Hughes, Dr. Dan Siegel, Dr. Bruce Perry and Dr. Bessel Van der Kolk, to name a few.

Catherine Wells
Rochester, Illinois

Dear FRONTLINE,

I found tonights program, "The Medicated Child" interesting and relevant...I found some of the comments on this discussion board disturbing.

How self-righteous of all of you who criticized those parents (like the Koontz's) who resorted to medicating their child as a last result. Congratulations to those who found dietary or environmental solutions to their child's behavior problems, but that does not mean this solution will work with every child. I am particularly angry at those posts insinuating or outright accusing parents of these children as having inadequate parenting skills.

I have raised a "bi-polar" child, who is now an adult. He was an inconsolable infant, an explosive and enraged toddler (not temper tantrums--violent rages), a moody/irritable/destructive youth, and an irritable, depressed and at times suicidal adolescent. I, like the mother of DJ, would have done anything to help my child. I resent anyone who thinks I did not set limits, properly discipline, or feed my child a healthy balanced diet.

I wish children like DJ and mine did not need medication in order to be able to participate in society. In time, hopefully we will have more answers.

Could what Dr. Chang proposes (that early agressive treatment may prevent a kindling process which may in fact prevent full blown mania and depression in later years) be true? In that case, those of us who have chosen to medicate our children early may actually be saving our children from more debilitating mental illness later on in life.

Jackie Orent-Nathan
Andover, MA

Dear FRONTLINE,

My daughter, who is now 14, was diagnosed with early onset bipolar disorder at age 7. Her symptoms first exhibited as hyperactivity and aggressiveness but quickly deteriorated to hallucinations, rage, ultra rapid cycling moods, insomnia, and anxiety. After attempting to jump out of a second story window, she was admitted to a partial hospitalization program and was placed on Lithium. My daughter also underwent a complete neurological evaluation which did not reveal any underlying medical conditions. Rachel was stable until puberty and was on multiple medications from the age of 10 until 14. She has been hospitalized four times in the last year and is currently in a Residential Treatment Facility.

A year ago, my daughter was suicidal, self-injurious, and alternated between severe mania and severe depression. My daughter currently takes Lithium and Clonidine and is a different child than she has been in years. In addition to medication, we participate in family counseling and individual counseling. The program in which my daughter currently participates provides support groups, special therapy groups, and behavior modification programing.

My child fits the classic clinic picture of both children and adults with type I bipolar disorder. I am grateful to the physicians who have cared for her and weren't afraid to place her on "powerful behavior-modifying medication." I am much more fearful of losing my daughter to suicide than I am of the psychotropic medication. I am convinced that Lithium has saved my daughter's life.

Valerie Beaston
Carlisle, PA

Dear FRONTLINE,

My son is nine and was diagnosed with ADHD and Bi-Polar Disorder at five years old. He takes the medications: Seroquel, Focalin XR, and Clonidine. These medications have literally saved his life. He is now able to attend school and socialize with the children in a normal manner. I agree there does need to be more reseach studies on these type of medications and children, but for some they would not be able to live a normal life without them. One must weigh the pros and cons of taking the medications and make an educated choice for their own children with the assistance of Doctors. For us they have kept my child in the home and helped him so he could attend school.

kim smith
nashville, tn