With final exams looming for thousands in Grahamstown, academic pressures are leading students to look for all kinds of study aids – including controlled substances. But they could be playing with their lives. This week’s show breaks myths and offers information to school pupils, university students and the people who care for them.
With final exams looming for thousands in Grahamstown, academic pressures are leading students to look for all kinds of study aids – including controlled substances. But they could be playing with their lives. This week’s show breaks myths and offers information to school pupils, university students and the people who care for them.
Up4Debate talks about ADD, ADHD and the medication used to treat it. The discussion panel includes an educational psychologist, a general practitioner, a clinical pharmacist and a psychologist.
Together they try to provide answers to questions about how Ritalin effects the growing brain, what the risks are of the unprescribed use of Ritalin and what our health professionals should be doing to help close the black market that has sprung up for Ritalin and Conserta.
Educational psychologist at DSG and St. Andrews school, Jane Jarvis: “We have got to start educating children and teachers who are working with these children. Information is power.”
General Practitioner, Dr Alice Achermann: “Medication is only a small part of the management of the problem. If you don’t have ADHD, it works as a stimulant, which causes serious mental illnesses.”
Jacqui Jooste, Clinical Pharmacist at Rhodes University: “We need to explain to students what can go wrong. I don’t think they realise that they are playing with their lives.”
Psychologist Scott Wood comments on the misdiagnosing and handing out of prescriptions to those who do not have ADHD: “To blame the doctors is too simplistic. It’s a complex issue that involves social pressures…”
Anchor:Sinazo Chiya
Producer: Nina Nel
Studio Technician: Simarashe Mutambanenge
and Muhammed Husein
