The issues around autism and vaccines brought to the fore a constant issue in health care in recent decades–overdiagnosis and subsequent overtreatment, which results in labeling most of the population as “sick” in some way. This overdiagnosis is driven by two primary factors. One is the desire of physicians, hospitals and other health care providers to generate more and more business. More patients means more money. The second is the enormous advertising budgets of the drug companies, which they use to lead viewers to believe they all have a disease which requires treatment by some very expensive drug.
An article in a medical journal notes this trend and the dangers it creates. While there may exist some underdiagnosis of people who have real diseases that need treatment, far more common is expansion of diagnostic criteria to add huge numbers of people to a disease category or even creation of a new “disease”. The author cites several common conditions–high cholesterol, high blood sugar, and high blood pressure to show how small changes in the criteria for a disease lead to massive expansions in the treatable population. This may generate revenue for providers and drug companies, but it costs the system large amounts of money and creates treatment risk for patients. (JAMA Article)
The common drug treatments for the above mentioned conditions all have side effects. Mental health is an area where there has been tremendous expansion of the diagnostic criteria. Routine difficulties in dealing with life’s issues become medical conditions that need treatment, usually by drugs with side effects. And there is no better way to be anxious and depressed than to convince yourself that you are anxious and depressed. Research suggests that all this overdiagnosis and overtreatment has not led to any better health or health outcomes.
Autism is a great example. A simple google search will expose how substantially this vague “condition” has been expanded. Any child who is a little different in how they socialize or learn becomes “autistic” and needs treatment. The impact of this labeling on the child’s sense of self and how others view the child is not positive. ADHD is another similar condition; a whole generation of active boys has been fed dangerous medicines to keep them from being quite so active.
If RFK, Jr. really wants to make America healthy again, he can start by stopping the practice of finding that every American has multiple diseases that require treatment.
An excellent book on this topic is “Bad Therapy” written by Abigail Shrier. Very insightful
that is an excellent book
I was on a jury where the judge polled the jurors about their experience with mental health and 80% of the jurors said they suffered from anxiety.
I just read Amazon summary of the Book Bad Therapy.
“In Bad Therapy, bestselling investigative journalist Abigail Shrier argues that the problem isn’t the kids—it’s the mental health experts.”
My observation is that the health profession needs to create lifetime patients and therefore instead of solving the problem, they make efforts to perpetuate or create the illness. The gender confusion falls into that category. The incidence of gender confusion has exploded in the last 10-20 years by 1000x.
Compare that with orthopedic surgery. Docs repair the ACL or torn rotator cuff, complete the rehab, then you are no longer a patient.