CABF Pepsi Project Fundraiser: Scientific Advisor Vivian Kafantaris received drug company money & medication for adolescent drug trial

CABF-bpkids parent support forum and website's scientific advisory council hosts yet another conflicted doctor who received not only money from drug companies, but medications for drug trial(s).

Vivian Kafantaris, M.D.

Director of Research in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Zucker Hillside Hospital.

Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York.

Lithium Treatment of Acute Mania in Adolescents: A Placebo-Controlled Discontinuation Study:

Objective
There are no published placebo-controlled studies of any agent in the treatment of acute mania in children or adolescents. This is the first placebo-controlled study of lithium's efficacy in the treatment of acute mania in adolescents.

Method
In this discontinuation study, participants received open treatment with lithium at therapeutic serum levels (mean 0.99 mEq/L) for at least 4 weeks. Responders were randomly assigned to continue or discontinue lithium during a 2-week double-blind, placebo-controlled phase. This study had 80% power to detect a 40% difference in exacerbation rates between groups (10% on lithium versus 50% on placebo).

Results
Twenty-three of 40 protocol participants (57.5%) experienced a clinically significant symptom exacerbation during the 2-week double-blind phase. However, the slightly lower exacerbation rate in the group maintained on lithium (10/19 or 52.6%) versus the group switched to placebo (13/21 or 61.9%) did not reach statistical significance.

Conclusions
This study does not support a large effect for lithium continuation treatment of adolescents with acute mania, mostly due to the unexpectedly high rate of exacerbations in the group that continued on lithium. Further studies are warranted to clarify whether acute mania in adolescents is lithium responsive

**This work was supported by USPHS grant K07 MH00970 to Dr. Kafantaris. The investigators thank Thomas Cooper of the Nathan Kline Institute, Orangeburg, NY, for providing the lithium assays and Roxane Labs for providing the lithium carbonate capsules and matching placebo.

Disclosure: Dr. Kafantaris receives research support in the form of grants and/or donation of medication and matching placebo from AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, Lilly, and Pfizer. "
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AstraZeneca--Seroquel
GlaxoSmithKline--Paxil
Lilly--Zyprexa
Pfizer--Zoloft, antidepressant & Geodon, antipsychotic,Xanax-anti-anxiety
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A parent MUST

Question the ethics of having a scientific advisory council riddled with pharmaceutical company paid doctors and researchers and wonder why the treatment protocol of the bipolar children is the drug based model.

Ask yourself why aren't these meds working for my child? and when they tell you "not every drug is for every person, it's art and science, it's refining the drug cocktail and micromanaging medications...." ask yourself why you are listening to these pharma influenced leaders regarding your child's growing brains and bodies. Long term effects have not been studied for safety and efficacy and the risk outweighs the benefits in many cases.