Attention Disorder in Children: Is the Literature Purged? Was It Ever Tainted?

Abstract

<h3>To the Editor. —</h3> After months of widely publicized investigation, psychologist Stephen Breuning has admitted recently (in court) to having invented a great deal of data supporting the use of methylphenidate (Ritalin) to control hyperactivity in severely retarded children.¹Robert Sprague, the former colleague of Breuning who first discovered and reported the fraud, calculated that between 1979 and 1983 Breuning's publications accounted for slightly more than one third of the published research in the psychopharmacology of mental retardation.²Several states depended largely on his publications in setting regulations for the treatment of the institutionalized mentally retarded.¹ The October 21 issue of<i>JAMA</i>contains one letter to the editor and two articles on the possibly excessive use of medication—particularly methylphenidate hydrochloride—in the treatment of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.^3-5Understandably, since specialists in attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder know of Breuning's fraud, none of the articles cited Breuning. Granted, they did