'Unacceptable' Numbers Of Pa. Foster Children Take Psychiatric Drugs, Report Says

A study found that 43 percent of 6- to 18-year-olds in Pennsylvania's foster care system were given such drugs in 2012. Those children were almost three times more likely than other children on Medicaid to take psychotropic medications, which are typically prescribed to manage mental health or behavioral symptoms. And they were four times more likely to be on anti-psychotics.

Pennsylvania foster children take psychotropic medications and antipsychotics at a far higher rate than other youth in the state, a study released Tuesday found. School-aged children in foster care use psychotropic drugs meant to treat mental and behavior disorders at nearly three times the overall rate for youth in the state's Medicaid system, according to a study by the state Department of Human Services and the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. (6/16)

Ezekiel Emanuel, chair of the department of medical ethics and health policy at the University of Pennsylvania, is not afraid of delivering difficult news. Speaking to biotech and health executives at an invitation-only event Monday in Philadelphia, he said he was invited as a counter balance to other speakers, whom he described as "techno utopians," people who are gung-ho on medical technology and are less vocal on the costs to the entire health care system. (Burling, 6/17)

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