Kids Library Home

Welcome to the Kids' Library!

Search for books, movies, music, magazines, and more.

     
Available items only
Print Material
Author Barber, Charles, 1962-

Title Comfortably numb : how psychiatry is medicating a nation / Charles Barber.

Imprint New York : Pantheon Books, c2008.

Copies

Location Call No. OPAC Message Status
 Axe 2nd Floor Stacks  616.8918 B233c 2008    ---  Available
Edition 1st ed.
Description xix, 280 p. : ill. ; 25 cm.
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (p. 231-266) and index.
Contents Who medicated Iowa? -- The commerce of mood -- The triumph of biological psychiatry -- American misery -- Cogito, ergo sum -- The human factor -- The sea snail syndrome.
Summary Public perceptions of mental health issues have changed dramatically over the last fifteen years, and nowhere more than in the rampant overmedication of ordinary Americans. In 2006, 227 million antidepressant prescriptions were dispensed in the United States, more than any other class of medication; that year, the United States accounted for 66% of the global market. Here, psychiatrist Barber provides a context for this disturbing phenomenon. He explores the ways in which pharmaceutical companies first create the need for a drug and then rush to fill it, and he reveals the increasing pressure Americans are under to medicate themselves. Most importantly, he argues that without an industry to promote them, non-pharmaceutical approaches that could have the potential to help millions are tragically overlooked by a nation that sees drugs as an instant cure for all emotional difficulties.--From publisher description.
Subject Mental illness -- Chemotherapy -- United States -- History.
Psychotropic drugs -- Marketing -- United States -- History.
Psychotropic drugs industry -- Moral and ethical aspects.
Biological psychiatry -- United States -- History.
Psychiatry -- United States -- History.
Deceptive advertising.
Mental Disorders -- drug therapy -- United States.
Drug Industry -- United States.
Drug Therapy -- utilization -- United States.
Psychiatry -- trends -- United States.
ISBN 9780375423994
0375423990
Standard No. NLM 101311628
NZ1 11629323
AU@ 000041945096
IG# 9780375423994

 
    
Available items only