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Old November 11th, 2010, 08:34 PM
ktinsley ktinsley is offline
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Question Psychotropic Meds and Parental Compliance

I wasn't sure where to post this so I thought General Discussion might be a good start. I am a Social Worker with a very large school district in the Special Education Department. As I'm sure you can guess, many, if not most of my students (I work solely with elementary school age children) are taking some type of psychotropic medication in one form or another. My question is this: Does anyone know of a good article, website, leaflet, flyer, something, that explains the importance of giving meds consistently? The debate about whether or not small children should be on psychotropics aside, most of kids are on them, but most of my parents fail to give them to the children appropriately or consistently. I constantly get the "they don't work" (they expect a miracle after 2 weeks), or "they make my kid a zombie" and the like. I explain until I'm blue in the face that it takes several weeks for meds to work, and even then the medication might need to be adjusted or changed, or I try to get them to understand that not giving the meds on the weekends, or giving them erratically (every couple of days is common), is going to likely make the situation worse. Most of the parents do not want to talk to their child's psychiatrist (or the more likely prescriber, their general MD) because they feel they are being given information that is way over their heads. I try my hardest to explain it in the simplest of terms but because I'm not a doctor, they won't listen. It's a double edged sword. I have been looking for some kind of article that is written by a doctor or other professional that explains the importance of giving meds as prescribed, or that gives information on the risks or side effects of not doing so, but I can't find anything that isn't a journal article, which many of my client's would not understand. Anyone have a resource or suggestion for this? Thanks in advance for any help you can give me!
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