Nah, I was just pissed. But a pharmacist giving someone the wrong drug, even if not harmful, is a pretty goddamned serious matter.
I am not much in favor of lawsuits when no harm has occurred.
However, without supporting the lawsuit, I would definitely get in touch with the head pharmacist and ask what is going on. Substituting generics for brand name is fine, but they are supposed to be the same chemicals. Either the pharmacy is playing games for fun and profit or someone at the pharmacy is irresponsibly ignorant.
Without pushing a lawsuit, some action should be taken to stop that from recurring.
Options might include getting hold of the insurance company to see whether they were billed for Ritalin or Adderal or, if the pharmacy tries to bluff their way out, calling the DEA to ask how they view that.
If it really was a simple mistake, the person should be put on notice that such mistakes are not to be tolerated, but if there is some game being played, it needs to stop.
Adderol and Ritalin are most frequently prescribed for children, actually, so in this case, I don’t think that’s a factor.
It is, however, incredibly neglient of the pharmacist.
There are studies in progress, from what I understand, that show that the root cause(s) of autistic spectrum disorders (ASD) can also involve ADHD, dyslexia, Aspergers and autism. I have also been given to understand that the DSM-V may well list ADHD as part of the ASD family, as there is mounting statistical evidence from co-morbidity.
Sorry, I ain’t biting on some anti-drug, anti-corporate screed. Dr. Casanova works around the corner from me, and has found evidence of physical brain structures that can explain ASD, including ADD/ADHD, better than opinion dressed up as fact. In the interest of full disclosure, my son was diagnosed 5 years ago with ADHD, and three months ago with Aspergers Syndrome. As a research technologist and an MS student, my bias is toward biochemical studies of diseases, disturbances and syndromes, including behavioral abnormalities. What about you?
I don’t think **blueslipper **means it in a harsh or critical way, necessarily. My first thought is also - why the *hell *do we need to drug kids up so young? Isn’t there another alternative before we resort to medicine that we don’t fully understand. But, as you say, that’s my opinion only and I won’t say anything more, and as I don’t have kids, don’t really have ground to stand on, either.
Since you asked I though I’d throw in my $0.02. The reason is pretty simple, the school enviroment is not compatable w/ people w/ ADD, as well as many jobs. It is not what they were made to do. Some people have the resources to move their kids to schools that are designed to work with people w/ ADD, more hands on - more stimulating. Others don’t, or don’t know of this option, so the only way to make them fit in is to modify their kids by the use of drugs.
So in short it is our ‘cookie cutter - one size fits all’ schools that are the issue - not ADD kids.
you don’t mention if you have ADD, but if you are feeling incredible jacked for hours and giving you lack of sleep, it doesn’t seem like it was a good ‘medication’ for you.
Both meds are short acting, and leave fast. Yes there can be some withdrawal, which could cause more lack of focus. For some people this is a advantage, they can take it when needed, but not daily. This is more for adults w/ ADD however, who might have a ADD friendly job (one that naturally provided stimulation).
Perhaps you’re right, in which case I’ll back off. As for drugging kids so young, well, look at diabetes, type I. The kid needs insulin to regulate blood sugar. So what? you might say, there aren’t any problems or symptoms except that the kid’s thirsty all the time and has to hit every bathroom in sight. But by not regulating blood sugar, he/she may lose limbs later in life from vascular problems, lose eyesight, and be at a high risk for a heart attack or stroke. Prevention now for a disease with a known physiological cause improves quality of life now and later. The same goes for treatable psychiatric or behavioral disorders, especially those who have been found to have a physiological cause that can be compensated for using drugs.
Insulin won’t cure type I diabetes and Ritalin won’t cure ADHD, but they both compensate for something the child is physiologically not able to do. Behavior modification, changes in diet, etc can compensate for some deficits and make life easier, but they don’t address the biochemical problem. Now, I’m not advocating drugs or behavior modification to the exclusion of the other. Together they provide a comprehensive treatment that does more than either one alone can achieve.
Vlad/Igor
FYI, Ritalin’s generic is methylphenidate.
Because, sometimes dietary changes, coping strategies, etc don’t work. We have a child who cannot learn.
Sure, there are plenty of alternatives to try. If they work, that’s great. No side effects to worry about, and no deductible for the parents. Medication is for when all reasonable alternatives, have been tried.
We don’t fully understand the brain. However, giving Ritalin etc to children with ADD/ADHD is one of the most intensively and exhaustively studied things in psychiatry. We have decades of studies telling us that we aren’t hurting these children.
Adderall lasts significantly longer than Ritalin - maybe 6-8 hours total (maybe less if you’ve taken it for a while). At least, that was part of what my doctor told me many years ago.
I have been using Adderall regularly since 1998. I have never once seen the 10 mg tablets appear in any other shape or color than blue oval. Ever. Generic, or otherwise. I have also never seen it say anything other than “Amphetimine” on the bottle. The word “salts” has never appeared. I am looking at about 7 containers right this very minute.
I am 32 years old, 6’5, 230 and very, very rarely do I ever take an initial dose larger than 15 mg. I might take an additional 5mg 3 hours later, which my doctor says is quite fine, and common practice. However, I suppose size might not be the only factor in determining dosage. I just find that there is less of a “peak and valley” effect my way.
I began having difficulty sleeping after about 1 year of use, though I now avoid taking any more after 3 or 4 in the afternoon. Bedtime is 11 or 12.
Anyway, that’s a part of my experience.
A lot of drugs are labelled as not being for children or pregnant women only because they never studied how they affect children and the unborn. Probably as many are labeled that way for that reason than are because the drug causes damage to growing children and/or birth defects. CYA isn’t a bad policy when they honestly don’t know yet if it’ll cause problems.
Amphetamines in their pure form are not very soluable in water, and converting them to a salted form makes them more soluable. Since we are water-based organisms, water soluable drugs or salts of drugs will have an easier time making it to where they need to go in the body than those that are not as soluable. Salting a drug does not necessarily make it less potent, only more likely to be absorbed into the body.
Vlad/Igor
I would just like to say: Thank you for getting your son’s problem diagnosed and treated, even if you don’t completely like what the treatment entails! Thank you for not sweeping it under the rug and just trying to “cope” and pretending it’s working when it’s not.
I grew up with ADD (no hyperactivity – I was dreamy and detached, often didn’t appear to be listening, but not bouncing off the walls) and even though my parents knew there was something wrong, because I was testing very well on standardized tests but utterly overwhelmed in school, they did nothing about it because my mother didn’t believe AD/HD was “real”, and that it was “just an excuse for people to dope up their kids”. As a result, I came to what seemed like the natural conclusion at the time: I was just more stupid than everyone I knew.
I struggled along until I was 12, at which point I had a complete nervous breakdown and had to be pulled out of school. Again, my parents ignored the warning signs of this until I just completely lost it one day. I was homeschooled through the rest of my ‘highschool’ years, and did pretty well under that format, but had -another- nervous breakdown within a month of starting college.
At that point, my father got things dealt with. I guess a hysterical 19 year old is scarier than a hysterical 12 year old. The change since I started taking medication (which was years ago) is indescribable. I’ve been able to do things that I thought I was too “stupid” or “disorganized” to do. My only regret is that I had to go through my childhood struggling the way that I had. I wouldn’t go back to it for anything.
(My doctor insists on seeing me every couple of months to take my blood pressure because hypertension can be a problem with a lot of AD/HD medications – which are, BTW, NOT exactly the same thing as speed unless you want to count caffiene as being the same thing as speed as well – but in all the years I’ve taken it, I haven’t had any problems with that. There can also be some problems with appetite loss, sleep problems, and anxiety. But not everyone has these problems, and they can be dealt with if you know what to look for.)
The consequenses of not treating AD/HD (either through medication and lifestyle changes if necessary or simply through lifestyle changes if not) can be pretty severe. I already mentioned the depression and the low sense of self-worth, which still leave emotional scars on me today. I think a couple of people have touched on the idea of ‘self-medicating’. Basically what this boils down to is that if there is something going on inside you that’s screwy or makes you feel bad, and you run across something that will make you feel better, you will tend towards seeking that thing out, sometimes to detriment of all else, including your health. Before I was diagnosed, I had an incredible caffiene habit, and all of that sugar and caffiene weren’t very healthy for me. But I needed them to feel focused. (I have one diet coke a day now, which I drink in the morning where most people would drink coffee.) AD/HD runs in my family and “coincidenally” so does alcoholism and drug abuse.
Sorry for being long-winded on this subject. 
That’s OK. A big reason we’re being as proactive as possible (and yeah, we’ve been all the way down the road with alternative strategies), is that my brother, I believe, is undiagnosed/treated ADD. He is a bad self-medicater, and there’s no way in hell I’m going to let that happen with my son.
My son is having issues of some kind - self diagnosis leads me to suspect dyslexia at least in English (I cannot do this any other way as we live in Japan. I know online stuff isn’t the way to do things properly.) His teachers are pointing to ADD or ADHD but have said that there is no educational help available whether he has a diagnosis or not.
Last week I cracked up and yelled at the teacher, and he this week sent me a list of places that will do ADHD diagnostics. My husband takes one look at the paper and sees they are all psychiatric units and balks.
And this week, son has suddenly “got it” as far as reading in Japanese is concerned and this weekend is ploughing his way through his first novel with no pictures (and written at his age level for the kanji characters.)
I am so mixed up as to what to do. Labels in this country, once applied, are so very hard to shed, and here any kind of mental or spiritual weakness is not easily forgiven.
So this is a long-winded hijack to ask those who have posted here about lifestyle changes that might help, can you direct me to any sites about living with ADD or ADHD that have been helpful to you. Googling brings up too much to deal with, and I can’t sift out all the loony ones.
Thanks in advance…
Hokkaido Brit
You should probably start a new thread with your question.
Yes, sorry. That was rude of me.
My son has been taking Adderall since 2000, he’s now 13. In that time, we’ve seen peach, blue and pink pills (all generics) and he’s been on a 30 mg dosage for years, he was maybe 75 lbs when he started that dosage. They’re usually labeled salts, as well.
Just adding more information, for comparison.
Regarding the why we ‘so quickly drug our kids, and so early!’ issue, I think you’d be very hard-pressed to find a Doper who’s kid is medicated that didn’t exhaust every alternative possibility first.
I wanted to quote this. This is exactly the kind of thing that I really like to hear. My 12-year-old son was diagnosed ADHD at two years of age. I resisted allowing the doctor to place him on any sort of medication until he was in school. I managed his diet, I managed his activities, I monitored everything he put in his mouth, read, played with, etc. It’s a tough row to hoe when you’ve got an ADHD kid that you’re too stubborn to let get help; I was also a single parent for all of that time.
Medication in our case is a 20mg SR tab and a 5 mg tab of methylphenidate on school days only. It is such a difference that it’s unbelievable. Dr. Grandpa is his pediatrician and he would never, ever prescribe or suggest anything that he thought was harmful or contraindicated in any way, to any child.
Update:
The Dr. called last night and said he’s certain he prescribed a larger dose of Ritalin, not Adderall, though he’ll confirm when he gets to his office today.
So, the pharmacy has some 'splainin to do.