TeenScreen
- Front
Group for Psycho-Pharmaceutical Industrial Complex
By
Ken Kramer and Sue Weibert
TeenScreen is a very controversial
so-called "diagnostic psychiatric service" aka suicide survey; done on
children who are then referred to psychiatric treatment. The evidence suggests
that the objective of the psychiatrists who designed TeenScreen is to place
children so selected on psychotropic
drugs.
"It's just a way to put more people on prescription drugs," said
Marcia Angell, a medical ethics lecturer at Harvard Medical School and author of
"The Truth About Drug
Companies." She said such programs will boost the sale of
antidepressants even after the FDA in September ordered a "black box"
label warning that the pills might spur suicidal thoughts or actions in minors.
Procedure on Young Children
Step One
TeenScreen lures kids as young as 9
years old into doing the suicide survey by offering them free
movie passes if they consent to the procedure. TeenScreen also offers a "passive
consent" form which requires no written parental approval. The
passive consent form is sent home to parents and if they don't return it
TeenScreen considers that the parents approve. TeenScreen officials favor
passive consent because they say it boosts
their chances of screening kids to 95% as opposed to the written parental
consent technique. What if the child forgets to bring the consent form home?
What happens if the parent is too busy to refuse in writing? They've consented
in the eyes of TeenScreen personnel. One tactic TeenScreen officials use is to
sell the child on the suicide survey first and after they have the child's agreement,
they later contact parents.
Step Two
The youngster is sat down and asked introverting questions such as:
1)
Has there been a time when nothing was fun for you and you just weren't
interested in anything?
2)
Has there been a time when you had less energy than you usually do?
3)
Has there been a time when you felt you couldn't do anything well or that
you weren't as good-looking or as smart as other people?
4)
How often did your parents get annoyed or upset with you because of the
way you were feeling or acting?
5)
Have you often felt nervous or uncomfortable when you have been with a
group of children or young people - say, like in the lunchroom at school or at a
party?
6)
Have you often felt very nervous when you've had to do things in front of
people?
7)
Have you often worried a lot before you were going to play a sport or
game or do some other activity?
Step Three
Based on the answers the child gives to the above questions he is then
shuffled off to a "clinician", who considers the label to use.
Depression? Social Phobia? Panic Disorder? Anxiety? Obsessive Compulsive
Disorder?
IMPORTANT NOTE TO PARENTS:
Parents are being mislead by a multi billion-dollar a year child drugging
industry that a diagnoses of "mental disorder" (ADHD, Bi-Polar, Social
Anxiety Disorder) are medical diseases or illnesses. This is a fraud. No child
has a brain scan, blood test, x-ray or any evidence of physical
abnormality to verify they are "ill" or "diseased."
Yet psychiatrists continue to pound the public with misleading and fraudulent
statements that these so called mental disorders are biochemical or neurological
conditions. That is false. They are simply a list of behaviors that
psychiatrists vote into existence and insert into their billing bible, the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
This has led to over 8 million children in the U.S. taking mind-altering
psychiatric drugs.
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders, 4th Edition
(DSM-IV), published by the American Psychiatric Association (APA), is
psychiatry's billing bible of "disorders" from which psychiatric
screening, diagnoses and their treatment are derived. The current edition lists
374 psychiatric conditions that have been identified as mental disorders.
Yet, the disorders contained in the DSM-IV are arrived at by consensus, not by
scientific criteria. There are no blood tests, brain scans,
x-rays, MRIs or "chemical
imbalance" tests that can scientifically validate any mental
"disorder" as a disease or illness. Canadian psychologist Tana Dineen
reports, "Unlike medical diagnoses that convey a probable cause,
appropriate treatment and likely prognosis, the disorders listed in DSM-IV are
terms arrived at through peer consensus"- literally, a vote by APA
committee members.
Step Four
The "clinician" summarizes his report and comes up with an
"impairment score".
Step Five
Based on how the child answered the "suicide survey", and which label
the clinician conjured up and how the child did on his "impairment
score" the child is then sent off for treatment.
It is important to note that TeenScreen claims throughout their literature that
"The TeenScreen Program makes no treatment recommendations". Now what
do you think is in store for a student who has been labeled with some imaginary
"disorder", has a certain "impairment score" and then is
referred to a psychiatrist?
You guessed it. Drugs. A survey of recently trained child psychiatrists found
the treatment for 9 out of 10 children
consisted of drugging. (Journal of the American Academy of Child Adolescent
Psychiatry 2002)
TeenScreen
no evidence of workability
As
to studies on TeenScreen itself, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (top
U.S. Government Research outfit) report of May
of 2004 states:
A. There is no evidence that screening for suicide risk reduces suicide attempts
or mortality.
B. There is limited evidence on the accuracy of screening tools to identify
suicide risk.
C. There is insufficient evidence that treatment of those at high risk reduces
suicide attempts or mortality.
D. No studies were found that directly address the harms of screening and
treatment for suicide risk.
TeenScreen has no proof that their survey
reduces suicide rates. The co-director of TeenScreen Rob Caruano, says that
suicides are so rare that you'd have to screen the whole country to see a
difference in mortality between screened and unscreened students.
TeenScreen was established in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1997
. According to a 2003 Tulsa World newspaper article, Mike Brose, executive
director of the Mental Health Association in Tulsa, stated: "To the best of
my knowledge, this is the highest number of youth suicides we've ever had during
the school year -- a number we find very frightening."
So much for the workability of TeenScreen.
The
Visible Players
Origin of TeenScreen? A drug company paid psychiatrist!
David
Shaffer
TeenScreen
was developed by psychiatrist David Shaffer of Columbia University and New York
State Psychiatric Institute's Division of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry.
Shaffer is a consultant and apologist of
pharmaceutical companies. Shaffer has served as an expert witness for various
drug companies and a consultant on various psychotropic drugs.
The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention sent out a press
release on May 8, 2000, that said Shaffer was their president and they
had just released a national survey they had done on suicide. The funder of the
survey? A pharmaceutical company. Shaffer's American Foundation for Suicide
Prevention has also received $1,250,000 from
yet another drug company.
Shaffer attempted to block negative British findings
In December of 2003 British drug regulators recommended against the use of
antidepressants in the treatment of depressed children under 18 because some of
the drugs had been linked to suicidal thoughts and self-harm. According to a
December 11, 2003, New York Times article,
Shaffer at the request of a maker of psychotropic drugs attempted to block the
British findings, sending a letter to the British drug agency saying that there
was insufficient data to restrict the use of the drugs in adolescents.
On Feb 2, 2004, a scientific advisory panel urged the Food and Drug
Administration to issue stronger warnings to doctors about the possible risks to
children because of antidepressant drugs. Shaffer told
the advisory committee that he doesn't have a better explanation for the
drop in suicides than the growing use of antidepressants! But he said, "we
don't know if they are related".
TeenScreen's
Director: Laurie Flynn
Laurie
Flynn, TeenScreen's director, searches out
teens who have committed suicide and then writes letters to the editors
throughout the country, promoting TeenScreen as the "solution". Flynn
is no stranger to the pharmaceutical industry. She formally served as the head
of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill which received millions
of dollars from pharmaceutical companies. Flynn has a tough time selling
TeenScreen. TeenScreen has resorted to luring kids with movie
rental coupons and food and drink coupons,
simply for the return of a release form, whether or not the student agrees to be
screened.
Flynn perjured herself in a Capitol Hill
Hearing on March 2, 2004, in front of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and
Pensions Committee on Bill H.R. 3063, when she testified: "In partnership
with the University of South Florida we are piloting district wide mental health
screening of 9th graders in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties". But in
fact, the day before Flynn's testimony, the Hillsborough County School District
said they were not partnering with TeenScreen, did not feel comfortable with the
information provided by TeenScreen and had serious concerns about TeenScreen
including liability and risk issues. In Pinellas County, TeenScreen was
prohibited from doing their suicide survey because Board policy protects the
identity of students when surveys are done. In addition, the Pinellas County
School Board Superintendent, Dr. Clayton Wilcox, has serious
reservations about partnering with such an organization.
William
J. Ruane Investment Advisor
Although
the name TeenScreen was not mentioned, the New York Times, reported,
on December 17, 1998 that William J. Ruane, an investment advisor put $8 million
into the screening research of Shaffer, the TeenScreen psychiatrist.
As far back as 1995, Ruane already had a "longstanding
relationship" with Shaffer. In June of 1995 the Ruanes funded a
professorship of Pediatric Psychopharmacology at Columbia University which
"supported training and research into the effectiveness of
psychopharmacological agents in treating childhood psychiatric disorders".
The Psychiatric Times reported in March of
1998 that Ruane and wife Joy, gave 1.5 million to study the effects of
psychiatric drugs in children to the New York State Psychiatric Institute,
Shaffer's home base.
According to a New York Post article in 1999,
the New York State Psychiatric Institute conducted experiments on kids, some as
young as 6, with a powerful mood-altering drug and failed to tell the children
or their parents about the most serious risks. While testing the drug on 30
severely depressed patients ages 12 to 18, researcher's notes indicated
"Some patients have been reported to have an increase in suicidal thoughts
and/or violent behavior". Records showed that at least four experiments
used this drug on young children including one funded by a large pharmaceutical
company.
Simple Math
TeenScreen's goal
is to screen every kid in the United States.
Since 1991, the Columbia University Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
has invested nearly $19 million in the
"research" and development of the Columbia TeenScreen program. Who
will reap the returns?
There are 47.7 million (47,700,000) public
school students.
There are 5 million (5,000,000) private school
students.
According to TeenScreen, 17% of kids screened
(8,959,000) accept counseling. 17% may be a low percentage, we're only taking
numbers supplied by TeenScreen.
9.9% of kids screened are drugged (5,217,300).
TeenScreen says less than ten percent are prescribed some type of drug. Note:
This means that a whopping 60% of kids who accept counseling as a result of the
suicide survey wind up on drugs. Keep in mind these are TeenScreen's own
numbers, actual figures may be much higher.
One example prescription for a common psychotropic drug is $15.56
per day.
5,217,300 students (customers) x $15.56 per day = $81,181,188 per day.
$81,181,188 x 365 days a year = $29,631,133,620 annually.
That's nearly 30 billion dollars per year in pharmaceutical sales courtesy of
the TeenScreen program.
Multiply that by a lifetime of addiction.
No wonder drug companies are tripping over themselves wanting to sponsor "Mental
Health" Screenings.
In Colorado
over 350 youths were suicide screened using TeenScreen's survey. They found that
over 50% were at risk of suicide and 71% screened positive for psychiatric
disorders at a youth homeless shelter. That's not science! That's a dream come
true for pharmaceutical company marketing types and bean counters.
THE
DOMINOS START TO FALL
Hillsborough County, Florida
School
officials did not feel comfortable with the
information provided by TeenScreen to implement it anywhere in the district and
did not have all their questions answered by the organization. They stated that
TeenScreen continued to say to others that Hillsborough County had
"partnered" with them when, in fact, they were only exploring.
Officials in Hillsborough County had serious concerns
about TeenScreen including confidentiality, the "capacity" in the
community for follow up mental services for identified students, the lack of
information from other school districts, the lack of written agreements with
community mental health providers, "ill defined" levels of "at
risk" concerns as a result of the screenings, the lack of a well defined
"continuity of care" and liability for the school district.
Pinellas
County Florida
On
January 25, 2005, the Pinellas County School Board decided in front of many concerned
citizens that TeenScreen should not be implemented there. School Board
member Jane Gallucci said that she was angry that Laurie Flynn, of Columbia
University, told a U.S. Senate committee on health and education matters 10
months ago that pilot TeenScreen programs were operating in Hillsborough and
Pinellas counties. Board Chairwoman Nancy Bostock called the program "an
intrusion for our students.'' False labels could embarrass students and cause
turmoil at home. "We could seriously do more harm than good," she
said.
Mishawaka,
Indiana
Teresa
and Michael Rhoades, parents in Osceola, Indiana became aware that their
daughter was "suicide screened" without any parental consent
whatsoever. TeenScreen used what they call passive
consent, a skimpy form with no warnings. Parents who did not sign the
form and return it were considered to have given permission. The trouble is
Teresa and Michael did not receive the passive consent form. Teresa
Rhoades became active in informing citizens in her area that TeenScreen
had infiltrated their school system. Local TV and newspaper covered Teresa's
story. One newspaper reported about a half-page ad that ran in the paper there
against TeenScreen: "The ad says diagnosis of psychological problems is
entirely subjective and there is no evidence that screening for suicide risk
reduces suicide attempts."
On February 28th, 2005, the Superintendent recommended in front of concerned
parents that TeenScreen be suspended pending a thorough study and also
recommended that "passive consent" be abolished.
On June 9, 2005, the South Bend Tribune reported
that Teresa and Michael filed papers to sue the Madison Center and also
Penn-Harris-Madison School Corporation. They claim their daughter took the test,
was improperly diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder and social anxiety
disorder. The family intends to seek the "maximum amount of damages."
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT
1. Does the Columbia University TeenScreen Program endorse mental health
screening for all teens?
TeenScreen states that their goal
is to screen every child in the United States by the time they're out of high
school.
2. Does
TeenScreen recommend treatment?
TeenScreen
materials say they make no treatment recommendations. However, let's pose this
question: If you have a child who's been asked a battery of potentially
upsetting questions, has been labeled with a bogus "mental disorder",
has been assigned a certain "impairment score" and then referred to a
psychiatrist, what do you think the treatment will be? When TeenScreen says they
do not recommend treatment it's like the gallows builder saying he didn't hang
that man!
3. Is
TeenScreen free?
TeenScreen's
promotional materials claim their suicide survey is free. Nothing
is free. TeenScreen isn't making it broadly known but they've sold their
10 minute computer administered suicide survey to Multi-Health
Systems, Inc., a Canadian company, which "publishes numerous
psychological assessments". Starting in January 2006 TeenScreen sites will
have to pay a fee.
What if the teen doesn't have
insurance or Medicaid? Pull out your wallet
school districts! TeenScreen recommends that you apply for grants or secure
funds to cover the "services" needed by the teens. According to a June
5, 2003 Weekly Planet article, Gwen Luney,
assistant superintendent for supportive services and federal programs at
Hillsborough County (Florida) Schools, says TeenScreen would cost the school
district roughly $200,000 a year -- $200K they don't have. "We're hesitant
to commit to a new program if there's a strong possibility we'll be seeing some
[money] shortfalls. Also, are we going to find a place for this [diagnosed]
child to go? If so, what if the child doesn't have insurance? Who picks up the
cost? Does it get passed on to the county? It can't be passed on to the school
district. And the liability factor is greater now that you've identified [the
at-risk student]."
4. Where are all the
TeenScreen Sites?
It's all a big secret. TeenScreen
refuses to divulge their locations and has a canned e-mail message they send
out: "We get a lot of requests from people who are interested in locating
and speaking directly with local TeenScreen sites and this can become a burden
on them. We are not authorized to give out our sites contact information unless
we have requested their permission to do so."
5. What is
"passive consent"? What does this really mean?
Passive Consent is way to get
around written parental consent and an effective method to get more children
screened. Passive consent requires parents to return a form
only if they do not want their child to participate in the screening.
According to an e-mail sent by a school
official concerning implementation of TeenSceen, "The interest would be to
screen as many as possible, beginning in 9th grade. The Passive acceptance style
was mostly discussed to increase the numbers from 50% for Consent to near 95%
for Passive"
This means if a parent does not open the mail or was too busy to study the form
and return it or if a child as young as 9 years old
loses the form on the way home, then TeenScreen will accept that as
"parental consent".
A federal law known as the Protection of Pupil Rights Act, requires written
parental consent before a child undergoes a survey, analysis or evaluation. A
TeenScreen newsletter discusses making
screening a matter of the schools curriculum as a method to bypass this law and
use passive consent instead.
According to TeenScreen, 15% of their programs
use passive consent. TeenScreen says they screened 39,080
kids in 2004. Based on the numbers they provided, 5,862 children were
screened in 2004 without written parental consent.
6. What can I do?
E-mail
your school district superintendent and ask if TeenScreen has been implemented
or if there are any plans to implement it. Keep things in writing. If the answer
is yes, alert other parents and voice your opposition. File a "parental
informed consent notice" with your child's school, which is a letter that
serves to require prior written notification from the school concerning any
intent to provide physical, mental health, or social services/counseling to your
child.
Researchers Ken Kramer records@psychsearch.net
and Sue Weibert info@teenscreentruth.com
are collaborating on this ongoing TeenScreen investigation. You can find the
documented facts at www.psychsearch.net/teenscreen.html
