Ritalin: An Introduction
Methylphenidate or Ritalin is a Schedule II stimulant, which structurally and pharmacologically resembles the amphetamines. It is suggested for the treatment of Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorders (ADHD) and narcolepsy. Just about 85 to 90 percent of all prescriptions for methylphenidate are written for young children and teenagers for the treatment of ADHD.
Ritalin is related to amphetamines, a class of chemicals that replicates the function of neurotransmitters in arousing the nervous system. Amphetamines were first synthesized in the 1880s, and since the 1920s, their capacities to stimulate activity have been widely appreciated. By 1970, fifteen different pharmaceutical corporations manufactured over thirty kinds, amounting to 12 billion pills annually.
Ritalin, with the chemical name methylphenidate, is within this group (Jenkins, 1999, 3031; Steinberg, 225). Methylphenidate was first synthesized in 1944 as part of a search for a non-addictive stimulant, and used in the United States ten years later, when the FDA to treat narcolepsy, depression, and lethargy endorsed it. Researchers recommended the drug for controlling children’s behavior in 1963 (Breggin, 180). It was reborn as Ritalin by the pharmaceutical company Ciba-Giegy in the early 1960s as a memory aid for seniors, before being redisposed yet again for use on children (Diller, 21–22, 25).
By the mid-1960s, it was the drug of choice for treating performance and behavioral issues in United States children, perhaps an early sign that psychoanalysis was on the wane (Sandberg & Barton, 1996, 11–12). In 1970, 150,000 children were on the drug, increasing to 900,000 in 1990. Across the 1990s, the number of United States children and adults diagnosed with ADD/ADHD rose, to 2 million in 1993 and 3.5 million by 1997, with most patients taking Ritalin and some using Dexedrine. During that period, the amount of Ritalin produced increased by 700 percent, an astonishing figure for a controlled substance..........
