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Republished with permission from AbleChild.
It’s news when the stepdaughter of a former Vice President takes to social media and raises issues about the lack of information provided to psychiatric drug users. Her concerns are in line with the legislation AbleChild currently is promoting with state and federal legislators.
Ella Emhoff, the daughter of the second gentlemen Doug Emhoff and Vice President Kamala Harris has no plans to curtail her psychiatric drug use but raised a number of important issues about psychiatric drug use that could have come directly from AbleChild’s “Exit Plan.”
First, it is of interest that Emhoff admits to having been prescribed Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) or antidepressants for “over a decade…almost 15 years.” Given that Emhoff is 26 years old, this would have Emhoff prescribed SSRIs when she was eleven? That’s young by anyone’s measure and it’s difficult not to wonder what was the diagnosis that got her the first prescription of SSRIs, how often that antidepressant has been changed, increased or whether it has become a cocktail of psychiatric drugs?
Emhoff raises her concerns in response to a Wall Street Journal podcast discussing SSRIs and Emhoff explains that “they were calling out the lack of research on long-term use of these things (antidepressants).” Emhoff explains, that there’s a “lack of information that doctors give about coming off the meds and the psychological effects they have and it got her thinking how little I thought about that kind of naively.”
Emhoff admitted that she had tried to come off the SSRI and she “noticed that every time I’ve gone off of it (antidepressant) for a week or missed it or for whatever reason, I’ve had a really hard time.” “I don’t know,” explained Emhoff, “if this is something you guys (Emhoff’s followers on social media) think about or relate to this…whether this is something that is talked about?”
But it was Emhoff’s honesty about the withdrawal from antidepressants that really hit home. According to Emoff, “so many of us are on these meds and people get off of them and they kind of breakdown and it can be really bad.”
AbleChild has been fighting for informed consent about these psychiatric drugs and can’t help but empathize with all those who have been prescribed psychiatric medications without information about what expect not only when on the drugs, but also when withdrawing from the drugs.
AbleChild currently is working to get Congressional legislation passed that would make it mandatory for all prescribing physicians to provide the following information as a kind of “exit plan” from psychiatric drugs.
- Physicians must conduct all biological tests first to rule out any possible medical condition.
- Physicians must advise patients that the mental health diagnosis is not based in science and there is no abnormality in the brain that is the diagnosed psychiatric disorder.
- Physician must advise patient of alternative treatment other than drugs… exercise, diet and talk therapy.
- Physicians must advise patients that the pharmaceutical companies do not know how the recommended psychiatric drug works in the brain for the disorder.
- At first prescription, physicians must provide an anticipated “treatment” timeline. Start date and expected end date for each drug.
- With each prescription, physicians must provide written expectations of the drugs with specific timeframes.
- Provide patient with written information about when prescription drug is anticipated to work and what specific possible life-threatening adverse events to be aware of for each prescribed drug.
- At first prescription, physicians should provide patients with return in-person appointment to review behavioral status and discussions about continuation or discontinuation of specific drugs.
- Physicians must provide detailed written information about withdrawing from each psychiatric drug and should be overseen by physicians on weekly basis.
- Three-, six- and nine-month physician follow-up recommended after withdrawal from all psychiatric drugs.
Emhoff’s concerns about adverse events and withdrawal symptoms are real and experienced by too many patients without having any idea of what to expect. Those physicians prescribing the mind-altering drugs have a duty to “first do no harm.” If patients are not provided with all the information needed to make an informed decision about treatment options, then there is no informed consent.
It is ironic that Emhoff would wade into such troubled pharmaceutical waters when it was Emhoff’s stepmother “momala,” Kamala Harris, who along with her boss, Joe Biden, spearheaded one of the largest mental health programs in schools under the guise of “gun safety” called the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA of 2022).
Despite this legislation affecting school-age children, there is no guidance in that legislation that would provide all the necessary information that is needed for informed consent. Something that Emhoff now believes is troublesome.
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AbleChild is a 501(3) C nonprofit organization that has recently co-written landmark legislation in Tennessee, setting a national precedent for transparency and accountability in the intersection of mental health, pharmaceutical practices, and public safety.
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