Posted by Alan on December 5, 2002, at 13:34:55
In reply to Re: Social Anxiety in OZ (Damn Benzophobes) » Alan, posted by Squiggles on December 5, 2002, at 11:43:42
> Alan,
>
> To do the issue justice, i could go back
> to my notes and posts at "Benzoland" and
> retrieve all the research I have done, as
> well as the debated in The House of Lords
> and the voluminous evidence Charles Medawar
> and others have collected. There are books,
> articles, doctors's testimonials, patients'
> testimonials -- there is enough evidence
> for the huge civil lawsuit that was started
> in England some years ago, but dropped for
> lack of funds.Well then the movement wasn't so big and overriding a health issue after all then was it?
>
> Please don't make me go through it again - you
> can look for yourself.
>
> At the end of the day, I do believe that no
> matter what contrary evidence i prsented (for
> example it is 25 years that the benzos have
> been used, the practice of giving them on
> a daily basis for anxiety is presently being
> dropped, the realization by the Brits and the
> Canadians at least, that rage accidents, pilot
> mistakes, domestic violence, car accidents,
> rebound panic attacks, psychotic episodes, insomnia,
> elderly falls and breaks of bones, etc.
> can all result from habituation to these
> drugs and do.Well then there are a lot of other drugs that can just as well lead to the same outcome but they aren't singled out by political bodies and scare tactics and half-truths put out by Benzo.org. This is simple catastophising for purely political purposes (House of Commons debate about the pushes and pulls regarding the commercialisation of the newest drugs such as AD's to treat anxiety) and the whole rationale of throwing the baby out with the bathwater is rediculous and an overreaction IMO and many doctors that specialise and use these medications in monotherapy know this as well.
Do Doctors consult benzo.org for their medical information? No. They assess individual needs if they are good ones - or alternatively if part of a big HMO or NHS, put the ssri flavor of the month in front of the patient after a 5 min consult after having waited 2 months to be referred to a psych that more often than not has an instinctive cookie-cutter corporate mentality because of their training influenced directly by the drug co's...even down to the medical school level in many cases.
>
> When I got off the Xanax (which gave me years of
> panic attacks) my doctor congratulated me. Why?
> Because it is almost impossible to get off.Impossible to get off FOR YOU.
> Also, your assertion that this habituation could
> be managed and that i needed the drugs in the first
> place is wrong on two counts: One, the anxiety
> may have been percipiated by something else, e.g.
> hyperthyroidism (in my case),Then that's simple misdiagnosis and misprescribing as many cases are. One doesn't just start throwing psychotropic meds unless a complete physical study is done first....especially thyroid!
>and secondly, you
> are proposing indirectly that someone started on
> Xanax at the age of 16, should continue to take
> them forever -- that would require the accumulation
> of the dose. My own doctor, did not want to raise
> the dose after it got high in his opinion. Why?
> Because a high dose of benzos lead to a high
> and more intense accumulation of side effects, not
> to mention the interaction with other drugs. Case
> in point, I had dyspnea at the higher levels of
> benzos before I lowered them.Well, I suppose if you weren't misprescribed in the first place there wouldn't have been this experience. But I really don't know and you seem to really not know. I don't know why I was prescribed AD's for 8 years for an anxiety disorder and suffered greatly because of it until I was prescribed without bias a bzd. I'm a victim of the system too.
A 16 year old needing an axiolytic most definitely stay on the drug if they are symptomatic. Lifetime? I never proposed such a thing. What are the alternatives if medication is in the end needed? To be habituated to an AD that DOESN'T treat symptoms adequately - and suffer worse withdrawals because that's what the latest reports worldwide are telling us via that meaningless organisation called the WHO. Should they go untreated and suffer the consequences both socially and medically of missing life's opportunities for fear of "possible" long term effects?
That's a PERSONAL decision and needs to be presented as such for individual assessment *in perspective*...not by governments, by pharm reps and their corporate docs with some of their anti bzd-babble, not by anyone.
It's all a cost/benefit assessment. That should be left up to doctors and their patients and no one else - not government run health care systems unduly influenced by political and moralistic organisations such as benzo.org with their extrapolations for what's good for society based on, at best, very limited reports of their lack of safety.
>
> As for the Rivotril, I am not so sure that I have
> epilepsy just because i am bipolar. I think that
> was a vogue 20 years ago to diagnose bipolars as
> being a species of epileptics and therefore add
> an anti-convulsant. I felt perfectly OK when i
> was given Rivotril with just the lithium. I did not
> know why i was given it. But i know, and my
> doctor knows that after 15 years i cannot get off
> with a seizure or a stroke or both.
>
> And one last point: these are not individual
> guidelines that i have been treated under - these
> are the medical and pharmacological state of the
> art that has been practiced on everyone with
> bipolar disorder or affective and anxiety disorders
> in the past 25 years.How could they be state of the art if they are 25 years old? Sorry but the contoversy is a limited one and no amount of exggeration based on individual cases as is the case on bzd.org is going to change the strident, vocal minority rhetoric that the site engages in.
>
> But, as you said, or should I say, complained,
> they are presently being changed on account
> of the horrendous addiction and withdrawal
> phenomena now cited in the medical literature
> and legal records.Huh? Maybe you complained about this but I haven't.
>
> As for WHO -- if any report i have read is
> general - it is that one. But, as i said
> the truth will out, especially if it is the
> administrators, the doctors, and the health
> professionals who take these drugs. There is
> nothing like experience to provide conviction
> in a theory of this type.
>
> SquigglesConviction isn't enough without evidence that shows truth. The WHO report which you cite as general would be more aptly described as broad and providing perspective based on the study of 40+ years of independent research by one of the most prestigious non-commercially influenced organisations in the world.
Post whatever you feel you must but after awhile, the rhetoric comes awfully close to looking like crying fire in a crowded theatre.
Do you have a risk/benefit analysis formed of the 10 top AD's too, the same for Maoi's, the same for seroquel, neurontin, etc, etc, etc....all used to treat the symptoms of anxiety disorders?
That's the real issue.
Perspective and context. Otherwise it's just another boogey man agenda being carried out by those few that have gotten burned by the infrequent unexplainable bad reaction, misdiagnosis, misprescribing, or mismangement...all of the very same pitfalls that should be afforded to the other psychotropics, not just the lowly bzd.
Alan
poster:Alan
thread:130480
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20021203/msgs/130658.html