5 percent of Americans (that is more than 13 million) doctors think it could rise to 7 or 8 percent, 4% to 6% of the U.S., and 18.8 million American adults or about 9.5% of the U.S. population. These numbers represnt,in order, the percentage of Americans suffering from post traumatic stress disorder, ADD, or ADHD, and depression.
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is mainly diagnosed in patients who have fought in a war or seen some horrific murder, however, there are now more and more people being diagnosed who have suffered from car accidents. This illness causes a patient to see the horrific event over and over again. They often do not seek treatment or are misdiagnosed.
Depression is a chemical imbalance in the brain that causes suicidal thoughts as well as a sunken feeling of abandonment. This is also sometimes misdiagnosed and some argue that it is often overlooked. Most depression victims either seek help or take medication to control their feelings. This illness is not self-invoked like many think, it is an actual medical disorder that has nothing to do with people wanting to feel these thoughts.
ADD and AD/HD are separate illness that often are grouped into the same category. Most often found in children, these illnesses are caused by a chemical imbalance. There are several tests that must be run that help professionals determine if the disease is present in a person, as well as how severe their case may be. ADD and AD/HD are both treated with medications that help the person concentrate. They are not curable, however, they do seem to deplete with age.
All of these conditions have something in common.
They are a major concern with Americans, specifically doctors. They are concerned that too many people are being diagnosed with these illnesses that are actually not suffering from them. IS that possible? The doctors are trained professionals, sure sometimes someone will slip through the cracks and try to be diagnosed with these illnesses for purposes such as medications. But, you rather have those few people getting treatment for an illness they don’t have, or leave those with these illnesses untreated?
If someone really was seeing flashbacks of the day their mother was killed, committing suicide, or having trouble learning who are we to deny them the proper treatment. These are real conditions, why shouldn't they be treated as such?
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3 comments:
I think ADD & AD/HD is a real problem and should be treated. I really feel that in the last 10 years or so that any child that was active or some people may say hyper was all of the sudden diagnosed with ADD or AD/HD. I feel American children are over medicated. If in fact they have this problem please by all means medicate, if un sure give them activities that can help with thier hyper children. No one in in the eighties or before were medicated they just used alot of their energy outside, playing with friends and being active. Again, I am not saying if they really have this problem you should ignore it, let just make sure they REALLY have the illness!
You might want to read my recent post on professors using these drugs to enhance their mental output.
This is a very interesting and controversial topic, although how you start your blog post is very confusing. I had to go back and read the first paragraph three times before I picked up on what you were trying to do. You should introduce your subject first, just as you would if you were writing a paper. No one wants to go back to the beginning on the blog once they get down to the third paragraph and finally kind of understand what is going on. It would also be clearer if you connected the topics or at least put in a sentence that acts kind of like a thesis introducing the three disorders you will be talking about instead of just explaining what they are in three separate paragraphs. This would really help the cohesiveness of your post.
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