CCHR hosted an event following World Mental Health Day where experts presented solutions to the challenges faced when dealing with youth mental health.
Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR), a non-profit mental health watchdog dedicated to the protection of children, hosted an event on October 13th following World Mental Health Day at the Church of Scientology in Tampa. During the event experts presented solutions to the challenges faced when dealing with youth mental health to an audience of concerned parents, educators, clergy and mental health practitioners.
Children in the United States are three times more likely to be prescribed psychotropic medications than European children according to a new study which is one reason why the Florida chapter of CCHR gathered together a panel of experts to present safe and healthy alternatives to approaching and tackling the subject of youth mental health. [1]
The panel discussion was moderated by the president of CCHR Florida, Diane Stein, who set the tone for event by playing a short clip from the documentary “The Marketing of Madness: Are We All Insane?” which details how the psychiatric industry is attempting to penetrate into nearly every aspect of American life by marketing drugs directly to consumers and attempting to convince the public that they, their children and even their babies, have a mental disease in order to prescribe their drugs.
A panel of experts, who helped bring more awareness, information and resources to the mental health, education and childcare community present at the event, followed this introduction.
The first panelist to speak was Dr. Richard Wallace, a specialist in family and sports medicine, who currently runs Bayside Urgent Care Center, a medical clinic in Clearwater, Florida. Dr. Wallace covered the effects of psychotropic drugs on the body and his experience from a medical doctors perspective on the harm caused by these drugs including heart failure in children. Stressing the fact that psychiatrists use no tests whatsoever in diagnosing the various mental illnesses they claim that so many have, Dr. Wallace encouraged those in attendance to first look for the actual medical reason for a child or teens behavior as a first course of action.
Following Dr. Wallace, school principal and founder of the H.E.L.P. School in Miami, Florida, Barbie Rivera told her personal story of the push to have her son diagnosed and labeled with mental illness in the first grade and how this prompted her to look for alternative solutions.
Ms. Rivera covered how through correct education techniques and care her school has been able to help countless children achieve success without using the psychiatric labels and drugs their parents were told they needed in order to learn. Using Helen Keller as an example to demonstrate that anyone can learn, Rivera ended her presentation with success stories of children who graduated from her school, went on to college and in one case even won an Emmy.
Dr. Candice Stewart-Sabin, a clinical psychologist with over 22 years of experience and an advocate for alternative treatments to mental health, concluded the panel presentation by telling the audience how she lost her son as a result of psychiatric drugs. Citing statistics that show that therapy and counseling are proven to be far more successful than psychiatric drugs, Dr. Sabin spoke of her experience with the gross over diagnosis of psychiatric disorders and how she has found alternative treatments such as nutrition programs, improving the home life of a child and other non-drug treatments to be successful.
The forum was then opened up to questions from the audience, which was composed of psychologists, licensed mental health professionals, school counselors, teachers, doctors and members of child advocacy non-profit groups including Guardian ad Litem members. When asked, attendees reported that the forum was invaluable and that they hope to be able to use the information provided to improve how mental health issues are addressed when dealing with children and teens.
Sources:
[1] “U.S. Kids Take More Psychotropic Drugs Than Europeans,” Steven Reinberg and Healthday Reporter, Sept. 26, 2018, https://abcnews.go.com/Health/Healthday/story?id=5880138&page=1