Overdosed America

The conflict of interest inherent in corporate medicine has attracted its critics:

"American health care may not be the best at improving health most effectively and efficiently but it is certainly the best in the world at generating profits for the drug industry"

So says Doctor John Abramson on his OverDosed America Website. As described in his online biography.

After he had been practicing for about 10 years, Dr. Abramson started teaching Harvard Medical School students in his office. As his students became comfortable with the basics of primary care, he helped them to develop their skills in the "art" of medicine - understanding that the person-to-person connection they were making with their patients was not just a pleasant amenity but an integral part of good medical care. He also taught a course for several years at Harvard Medical School with Dr. Herbert Benson of the Mind/Body Medical Institute exploring the importance of the doctor-patient relationship in the healing process.

As the 1990s progressed, Dr. Abramson became aware that patient care was increasingly being compromised by the growing waste and commercialism in American medicine. By "researching the research," he found that the clinical studies presented in even the most respected medical journals were often biased by drug and medical device company sponsorship, and that the medical information available to even the most dedicated doctors often differed from what the scientific evidence really showed about the best way to take care of their patients.

In 2002, Dr. Abramson left practice to devote himself full-time to researching and writing Overdosed America, with the goal of helping patients and doctors to reclaim the basic mission of medicine, optimizing health most effectively and efficiently.

Now when you calculate the cost of this as applied to the field of Mental Health ...