Popular Attitudes and Beliefs About Tranquilizers

Insomnia and Its Treatment

“…For each item we asked respondents whether the problem (1) had bothered them during the past 12 months, (2) used to bother them but not during the past 12 months, or (3) never bothered them. Those who said they had been bothered by the problem during the past 12 months were then asked whether it bothered them "a lot" or "not that much."…”

“…The report addresses two broad topics: (1) the prevalence of insomnia, and the principal demographic and clinical characteristics of people who suffer from insomnia; (2) prevalence and patterns of use of hypnotics and other psychotherapeutic medications that are prescribed (or pur¬ chased over the counter [OTC]) for sleep, and demographic and clinical characteristics of people who use various types of sleep medications. METHODS Data for this report come primarily from the 1979 National Survey of Psychotherapeutic Drug Use.…”

The Benzodiazepines An International Perspective

“…There is, moreover, evidence that the level of prescription of tranquilizers for women who report with emotional problems is higher (Bass & Baskerville 1 981;McCranie 1978;Manheimer, Davidson & Balter 1973), but this is also true for those who arc treated by female doctors (Hasday & Karch 1981;McCranie 1978) . Hence, there is justification for the argument that the level of use in women is not too high, but that the level in men is too low.…”

Are benzodiazepines overused and abused?

“…Various household surveys assessing psychotropic drug use, levels of psychic distress, number of health problems and number of life events, and the relation 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 Year Figure 1 Anti-anxiety drug prescriptions filled in US drugstores from [1964][1965][1966][1967][1968][1969][1970][1971][1972][1973] (Balter, 1975;Mellinger, Balter, Manheimer, Cisin & Parry, 1978;Manheimer et al, 1973;Balter, 1973). This National Household Survey found 22% of their respondents to state that they had used a psychotherapeutic drug at least one time during the past year.…”

“…Manheimer et al (1973) A final question addressed by the National Survey concerned the diagnostic indications for which psycotherapeutic drugs were prescribed. Similar to the findings of the survey by Blackwell (1973), most prescriptions for anxiolytic drugs were not written for mental but for medical disorders.…”