Do they treat teens in mental health hospitals?

My friend's 12 year old has been in a facility for over 2 weeks after threatening suicide. He has ADHD (and I know it's over-diagnosed but I truly think he does) and was already on medication. Now he's been to group therapy and is on 3 medications! Do they treat teens or just medicate and talk? They have started to release him 2 or 3 times and then he pitches a fit and they sedate him. How is this helping?

It is my friend's child and there are other issues. I think he is just a sad little boy who has dealt with a lot of stuff. I hate to think he's just sitting at this hosptial, which is for adolescents and getting more and more drugs. I would just want to go rescue him if I were his parent! How sad to be left there!

There are good psychiatric hospitals that have an adolescent wing.

It doesn't. What they do is drug you up so you can't cause any trouble, and then they pretty much just talk to you. It's all about the medication now. They don't even really bother finding the root cause.

Medication and talking is treatment. Medication dosages take a while to get adjusted so the fits you describe are likely until the right dosage is found. It is helping to find the right dosage which will help him not to have fits once the right dose is found. Unfortunately, different people react differently to medicine so trial and error is the only way to determine which drug and how much each individual person should take

They do treat teens at mental health facilities. Unfortuneatly it is impossible to correctly diagnose most mental illness in teenagers as true mental illness until the age of 18 or post puberty. If the medications are helping , than that's a good thing . Talking is an evaluation tool and also helpful for your friend. Mental illness is serious and unfortuneatly can't be "cured" in all cases , just managed. Be patient and supportive , but also encourage your friend to stick with the program and not encourage any negative thoughts about treatment. Be positive and help him/her be positive too.

It's not like you can just treat mental health issues like a disease. The person has to want to get better, you can't force them because it's their mind. What they're really doing is just stopping him from killing himself. That's mostly what hospitals do, restrain people if they think they'll harm themselves or others. In fact that's the criteria for being able to hold someone.... They'll try to treat him but it isn't always possible, you can't just change someone's personality against their will.

They do treat teens however some places are different than others. Sedation is dealt out when he gets out of control to the point of injuring himself or others. They don't normally sedate for ADHD sounds like there is more going on there than just ADHD. they also don't hospitalize you for weeks at a time for ADHD. Based on what you have said... my guess is the sedation is because he has become increasingly threatening to either himself or others.. and being that he did threaten suicide my guess is they are not taking that threat lightly.
Keep in mind there are many laws in place on sedation... there must be alot of documentation done on why they sedated him. don't just listen to what he tells you ... try to get a copy of his chart... it will tell you every thing about what they are doing and why. Problem is only his parents or guardian can get it

Aren't those places obsolete? I would try a christian counselor. I also would recommend a University hospital that would give a referral to a Neurologists. I think that sedation will only treat the symptoms and not the cause of the problem. I think i would be leary of this...... Maybe he just doesn't want to go home for other reasons... He might not want to discuss with anyone

Medicating and talking (counseling/therapy is talking) are the ways in which people are treated in mental facilities. In other words, those are the treatments.

Does this child really need to be there, or could he be treated on an out-patient basis (where, basically the same things would be done).

Is there a valid reason why this child does not want to go home? Are his parents gone all day--where he would be alone? He could be afraid of being alone.

Is he having a problem in school? This could be another reason why he does not want to leave the hospital.

At any rate, sedating him is better than letting him throw a fit, and perhaps becoming worse. His parents should be talking to the doctors and other staff to find out just how long they intend to keep him there. I'm certain that they want to be sure that he will not harm himself if released.

Something is obviously troubling this child, or else he would be throwing a fit to get out of there--not to stay in there. The parents need to find out what that trouble is.

They treat, but I'm wondering: what is your idea of "treatment"? If they ONLY gave him medications, yes, that's a problem. However, you seem appalled that they "just medicate and talk!" which is actually the definition of treatment.

The group therapy is more than just a lot of people talking about what bothers them... at least, it's more than a one-way conversation. In the midst of these conversations, professionals, and people who have been there and understand, offer alternatives to negative behavior, and encourage you to accept the whole truth (the good and the bad) and teach healthy, effective coping skills.

The medications are probably his regular medication, plus a possible mild sedative at night (part of the treatment at inpatient is to encourage people to adapt a healthy routine, sleeping all night, waking at a regular hour, etc.). ADHD is one thing, but I don't know of people who only have ADHD and are suicidal, so they probably do have him on something for bipolar or depression.

The back and forth thing does sound bad, but from my experience, they want you to feel like you're ready before releasing you. It could be your friend's son really doesn't feel like he's prepared to be out in the world again and wants to stay until he is ready.

If they're sedating him after he's "pitching a fit" (assuming he's actually pitching a fit, and not just saying, "No, I don't want to leave yet, I don't think I'm ready"), something does sound wrong. Can't tell on here how much you're getting firsthand, and your idea of "pitching a fit" could be different from mine.

However, yes, most mental health facilities these days are set up to treat teenagers (in fact, a lot of them see more teenagers than adults), and "medication and talk" actually is the most effective way to treat mental problems.

The sad thing to me is that your friend's son is in there after "threatening" to commit suicide. If you mean he actually tried and it didn't work, or even if he did a "fake" try, yes, he needs to be there. But an unbelievable number of people, ESPECIALLY teenagers, threaten suicide, and most of the time, sad as it is to say (and I do NOT mean they shouldn't be taken seriously that something is wrong), the people who threaten it are not the people who would do it. Most suicides are suprises, because the person kept it to themself.