What We Know About the Effect of Psychotropic Drugs on Migrant Kids

A federal judge on Monday ruled that the government must obtain parental or guardian consent before administering psychotropic drugs—those that can affect the brain or behavior—to migrant children in its care. But plenty of questions still remain about what these drugs do to young brains in the first place. “The benefits or risks of psychotropic medications to brain development are only beginning to be evaluated,” says Dr. Manpreet Singh, director of the Pediatric Mood Disorders Program at Stanford University. “We haven’t actually looked, directly and in systematic ways, at the effects of these medications beyond an acute setting.” In 2012, Singh co-authored a review of existing research on pediatric use of psychotropics, and concluded that most studies have shown either benefits or minimal effects associated with kids taking these drugs, which are commonly used to treat psychiatric symptoms including depression, anxiety, mania, psychosis and attention issues. But the paper noted that “knowledge of the long-term risks of the various interventions is very limited,” leading to “justifiable concerns” about their use in developing brains — and Singh says her assessment remains the same six years later. “What we need are more carefully designed research studies to be able to understand the biological effects of trauma, as well as other events in childhood, and how treatments such as psychotherapy, as we...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Drugs healthytime onetime Source Type: news