News org questions skyrocketing prescriptions of antipsychotics to children

The St. Petersburg Times examines how more parents, who are at wit's end, are begging doctors to help them calm their aggressive children or control their kids with ADHD. Doctors are increasingly prescribing powerful antipsychotic drugs, which are approved by the Food and Drug Administration to treat bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

In the past seven years, the number of Florida children prescribed such drugs has increased some 250 percent. Last year, more than 18,000 state kids on Medicaid were given prescriptions for antipsychotic drugs. Even children as young as 3 years old. Last year, 1,100 Medicaid children under 6 were prescribed antipsychotics, a practice so risky that state regulators say it should be used only in extreme cases.