Why do people diagnosed with bi-polar disorder or schizoprhenia or whatever take meds than die quickly?

rbanzai
#1. May 28th, 2009, at 2:37 AM.

I’m sorry, I can’t agree with that premise. I’ve known people who were bipolar and although they had alot of trouble adjusting to their meds it did not kill them.

The medication used for mental illness is not an exact science and what works for one person will not necessarily work the same way for someone else. So it involves alot of trial and error.

Schizophrenia in particular is very difficult to treat.

But I have to reject the notion that people being treated with meds for these two illnesses “die quickly.”

Check with a doctor, not a lawyer.

Mr. Taco
#2. May 28th, 2009, at 7:38 AM.

Let me get this straight. You talked to lawyers about a medical question? That’s like asking a cop for business advice or trying to understand physics by talking to a clown. Whatever lawyers told you that, you should sue them.

I’ve known people who have been on meds for serious mental illnesses all their lives. We’re talking years, and in some cases decades. They are all alive and well. Many of these people would actually be dead WITHOUT the medication, because their risk for high stress and blood pressure or suicide are through the roof.

In other words, you don’t know what you are talking about. Neither do your lawyer friends. Maybe you had better hang out with someone with a brain instead.

panndora
#3. May 29th, 2009, at 3:06 AM.

Because the meds only cover up the symptoms t hey dont deal with the source of the problem and it just keeps getting hidden and festers and grows until it kills the person.

Mandy S
#4. May 30th, 2009, at 4:15 AM.

I definately think there is a flaw in your theory that people who are diagnosed with bipolar or schizophrenia “or whatever” take meds and die quickly.

Where else did you research, besides asking lawyers.

You are aware of the reason medical treatment is as expensive as it is these days, right? About how there are LOTS of lawyers willing to convince patients that their doctors are incompetent and that the treatments they are receiving are dangerous, and they should sue those doctors?

Yes, there are always risks when taking any kind of meds (even Tylenol), but most meds used for psychiatric problems are not “worse than taking crack cocaine”.

For certain psychiatric problems, yes, the anti-psychotic drugs given do have higher risks, but you must consider the fact that the people who take those drugs otherwise would be rotting away in some psych ward, labeled a lunatic. Perhaps they feel that being able to get a few decades of a healthy lifestyle is better than living to be eighty years old in a “home”, unable to care for yourself, marry, hold a job, or have children. Before these “dangerous meds” were around, the treatment for virtually every psychiatric problem was ten times worse than the meds are now. They got shock therapy. Pretty much every mental illness was treated with shock therapy, which is definately much more dangerous, and not even close to as useful, as the anti-psychotic drugs are today.

Did your lawyers tell you that the options, if you choose not to take the anti-psychotic drugs of today, are? You can have a debilitating illness, unable to care for yourself, hold a job, pay your bills, be in a relationship, have children, etc. You can spend most of your life in a home, and I’m telling you, those are not nice places to live in, even the good ones. Or you could be among the VERY small percentage of people who are able to live with their illness and still lead relatively healthy lives.

I’d take the meds.

Mad Mac
#5. June 2nd, 2009, at 12:14 AM.

Your lawyer advisers were prejudiced. I don’t know what the statistics are but I am 75, have schizophrenia paranoia, and have been on neuroleptic medications for over 40 years. The “tranquilizers” when they first came out in the 1950’s were godsends, allowing most (schizophrenics anyway) who were in hospitals to get out and lead fairly normal lives. True, there were some problems with early neuroleptic drugs causing Tardive Diskonesia but the newer meds don’t seem to have this effect.

I am an outpatient, on neuroleptic medications and no longer seem to hallucinate. I have lived a fairly normal life being able to work most of the time and attended two universities. I’m happy and physically healthy. I don’t plan to die anytime soon.

Good health, peace and love!

Pallas ™
#6. June 4th, 2009, at 1:22 AM.

I’ve heard something like that as well. ive taken meds before for mental issues & all it did was make me fat, thus getting stretch marks then….I developed an eating disorder & still have it currently.

so it just works as a ban aid & depression will bound to happen all over again. the med world is only concerned w/ $$ anyways…