Missouri sued over psychotropic drugs for foster care kids

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Child advocates filed a federal lawsuit against the Missouri Department of Social Services on Monday over allegations of inappropriately providing psychotropic drugs to foster-care children and systemic lack of oversight of the medications.

Attorneys for Children's Rights, the National Center for Youth Law and Saint Louis University School of Law Legal Clinics said the lawsuit is the first of its kind nationwide focusing only on psychotropic drugs given to foster children.

The state attorney general's office didn't comment Monday on the lawsuit.

The organizations filed the lawsuit on behalf of several Missouri children currently or formerly in foster care, including a 14-year-old boy who has been prescribed as many as seven psychotropic drugs at one time.

Lawyers for the children are asking a federal district judge to grant the lawsuit class-action status and order Missouri to implement systemic changes aimed at curtailing potential overprescribing of the drugs.

The lawsuit claims psychotropic drugs often are prescribed as "chemical straitjackets" for foster care children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder or conduct disorder, though there are few to no Food and Drug Administration-approved uses for the drugs among children.

The plaintiffs' lawyers say there's little research on how the drugs affect children's brains, and possible side effects include disorders that cause twitching, Type 2 diabetes, psychosis and suicidal thoughts.

"The bottom line is young kids -- still developing bodies and brains -- are exposed to powerful psychotropic medications in what is in almost all circumstances off-label prescriptions," Sara Bartosz, deputy director of litigation strategy at Children's Rights, told The Associated Press in an interview late last month.

The lawsuit alleges there's not enough state oversight of psychotropic medications, and the state keeps shoddy medical records for children in foster care, making it difficult for foster parents to administer medications properly.

The suit calls for the judge to order the state to keep better records, develop a stronger informed-consent policy and implement a system to flag potential overprescribing of psychotropic drugs.

According to court records, one former foster parent said she received a brown grocery bag full of medications in November 2015 when she first picked up the 14-year-old boy.

She said she didn't get information on his medical history or directions for how to give him the medications. The woman said after she gave the teenager his medications one night, he told her it felt as if he had knives in his eyes, and he was scared to sleep.

She said he also twitched, which she thought might be a side effect of his medications. He later was prescribed a drug used to treat tics caused by Parkinson's disease, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit said in January, the teen was taking seven psychotropic medications at the same time, including three antipsychotics.

Others on whose behalf the lawsuit was filed include sisters, ages 2 and 3, who were prescribed the antipsychotic drug Risperdal, which the lawsuit states is not FDA-approved for children younger than age 5.