The problem is when your child is misdiagnosed as having a condition that they don't actually have and then they are given medications (or therapies or other "services") which cause them harm.
THIS.
YES.
The difference between a diagnosis of diabetes/asthma/etc. is that there is a
measurable impairment relative to a normative control.
There is absolutely nothing subjective about impaired breathing or blood glucose metabolism. You can monitor it and plot it, and then measure it again after interventions.
No human subjectivity comes into play at all. Now-- before anyone assumes that I think that allopathic = nonsubjective and that psychiatric = subjective, that's not the case.
I
loathe studies that use "exercise tolerance" or "pain perception" as indicators for efficacy. They are notorious for producing artifacts that can't be reproduced.
But I agree with the complaints re: the DSM V, and there is a good reason. There is a huge difference between telling someone "I think that you're flirting with diabetes-- get out and get moving, drop some weight," and offering a person insulin because you think that they "might try it to see if they benefit" from it because they meet 3 of 7 items on a checklist.
Better diagnostic tools = better prescribing practices.
