[url=http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/16/us-usa-health-children-idUSBRE94F11N20130516]Up to 20 percent of children in the United States suffer from a mental disorder, and the number of kids diagnosed with one has been rising for more than a decade, according to a report released on Thursday by the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention.[/url]
Which leads me to this (or these) question(s).
1: Is this an actual "increase" or are we/doctors just getting better at diagnosis?
2: Was the rate of disorders the same previously, but we just labeled the kids as "difficult", "spoiled", "acting out"?
3: If the rate of "disorders" is a significant fraction, could it be that we're too narrowly defining what is "normal" or "healthy"?
It tends to remind me of an old saying that I heard when I was young. "Just because the doctor has a name for your condition, that doesn't mean that they know what is wrong with you or that they can do anything about it."
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I think the truth is that people are getting overzealous with making up disorders, claiming that a bunch of normal things are disorders when they are not. I say lots of perfectly normal people are being diagnosed with nonexistent disorders.