Have hyperactive kids been misdiagnosed with ADD?
Posted on 03/10/2007 11:28:14 AM PST by Stoat
Have hyperactive kids been misdiagnosed with ADD?
The psychiatrist who identified attention deficit disorder - the condition blamed for the bad behaviour of hundreds of thousands of children - has admitted that many may not really be ill.
Dr Robert Spitzer said that up to 30 per cent of youngsters classified as suffering from disruptive and hyperactive conditions could have been misdiagnosed.
They may simply be showing perfectly normal signs of being happy or sad, he said.
'Many of these conditions might be normal reactions which are not really disorders,' he continued.
Dr Spitzer developed the bible of mental disorder classification in the 1970s and 1980s, which identified dozens of new conditions including ADD and obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Since then hundreds of thousands of children have been diagnosed with ADD, a behavioural disorder linked to poor attention span, and ADHD, which adds an element of hyperactivity.
The disorders describe disruptive and restless behaviour that results in children having difficulty focusing their attention on specific tasks. ADHD is most commonly noticed at the age of five, and as many as one in 30 British children is said to have it.
It is often treated with drugs, with Ritalin being the most commonly prescribed.
Some scientists say ADHD is a genetic disorder that does not disappear with adulthood.
But sceptics believe the diagnosis is a 'biobabble' label, which has evolved from a soundbite culture that is too prepared to medicalise anti-social human traits.
Dr Spitzer, professor of psychiatry at Columbia University in New York, now says the classification led to many people being diagnosed as medically disordered when their mood swings and behaviour were simply normal feelings of happiness and sadness.
In a BBC2 documentary series The Trap, which begins on Sunday, he says that between 20 and 30 per cent of mental disorder diagnoses may be incorrect.
His admission comes as figures show that the amount spent by the Health Service on drugs to treat ADHD and similar disorders in children trebled to £12 million in just five years, from 1999-2003.
Almost 400,000 British children aged between five and 19 are believed to be on the drugs - despite doctors' fears about side-effects.
That is the equivalent of every child in Britain each taking more than four doses of the drugs every year.
NHS guidelines recommend drug treatment for the most severely affected, although there have been reports of cardiovascular disorders, hallucinations and even suicidal thoughts.
There have been at least nine deaths reported to the UK's Medicinesand Healthcare products Regulatory Agency since Ritalin became available in the early 1990s.
But Dr Spitzer, who chaired the taskforce that compiled the international Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, said he is less concerned by wrong diagnoses and possible side-effects from drugs, than failing to prescribe them where needed.
'By and large the treatments for these disorders don't have serious side effects,' he told the Times Educational Supplement.
'I mean, some do, but they're not that serious, whereas the failure to treat can often be very hard on the child and on the family.'
He acknowledged that some parents put pressure on doctors to diagnose ADHD and obsessive-compulsive disorder, and prescribe drugs.
'We don't know to what extent that's been happening inappropriately,' he added.
Ian Graham, headmaster of Slindon College, an independent boys' boarding school near Arundel, West Sussex, has 20 out of 100 pupils diagnosed with attention deficit disorder and a few more with related diagnoses such as oppositional-defiant disorder.
About 17 of the boys are prescribed drugs including Ritalin, while the remainder have their condition controlled through diets that exclude chocolate, sweets or gluten.
The school also employs therapy techniques, and the old-fashioned tactic of getting pupils to run off their energy in outdoor activities.
Mr Graham said: 'I've never met a parent who is happy with the medication. They would all prefer not to use them, but to a man and woman, they all say they can't believe the change in their sons' ability to concentrate in lessons.'
yes all of that. mindboggling. anyone who has been through the process of dealing with a child diagnosed with ADD and the attendant testing, expense etc. really loves hearing the ignorant expound on their poor parenting, laziness etc. my 12 yo daughter is ADD, not disruptive, not hyperactive, just has an inability to attend which combined with her learning disability causes her to be unable to learn if she isn't medicated. she is being raised by the same parents, held to the same rules in the home, and eating the same food as her siblings. yet they are high acheiving students and she is LD with ADD. let the ignorant expound about that which they know nothing.
These parents in your church are being very good first teachers of their children and as such the kids benefit from learning how to be appropriate. The common thread in these situations is that the parents take control and the kids follow their lead. That's not abusive, that's good parenting.
I do hate to burst your bubble though, but good parents come from every spectrum of society, not just those that are in your church.
Here is one about the doctor who prescribed the medicine.
Kifuji began treating Riley in August 2004 and diagnosed her with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and bipolar disorder. She prescribed the medications, including clonidine, a blood pressure drug for adults that is also sometimes given to children to reduce aggressiveness and help them sleep. Prosecutors allege that Riley's parents, Michael and Carolyn Riley, intentionally killed their daughter in December by giving her a clonidine overdose.
Psychiatrist takes paid leave after death of girl
Here is more:
The recent overdose death of 4-year-old, Rebecca Riley, in Massachusetts, demonstrates the dire need to educate the public about the practice of prescribing drugs for unapproved uses and the dangers of prescribing drugs like Zyprexa to children.
At the age of 2½, Rebecca was diagnosed with attention deficit disorder and bipolar disorder and was prescribed Zyprexa’s atypical cousin, Seroquel, along with Clonidine, an adult high blood pressure drug, and Depakote, a drug approved to treat adults with epilepsy. None of these drugs were approved for children and they were prescribed in a combination that has never been tested even on adults.
Activists take on Eli Lilly over off-label sale of Zyprexa
And here is an earlier article:
Lawyers for Carolyn and Michael Riley point to prescription records supplied by prosecutors and argue that those records show the Rileys did not have substantially more medication than had been prescribed for their 4-year-old daughter, Rebecca, who was found dead in their Hull home in December.
Boston lawyer Michael Bourbeau said that assuming Rebecca was actually given the number of pills prescribed for her between Aug. 16 and her death on Dec. 13, she was not being overdosed.
8mm
Very sad.
As would be true to form you take one statement and then over generalize it and turn it into a personal attack and an insinuation that I am an abusive teacher. Hey! a strawman created by you! What a surprise!
You must be spoiling for a fight if you are combative over that post!
i re-read your post and totally agree, there was nothing inflammatory in what you said. you make perfect sense, as do all your posts on this thread. my LD daughter attends a private LD school in Annandale, and my older kids are in private Catholic prep schools in DC. as i said earlier, we are raising my daughter the same way, feeding her the same food, and sent her to the same Catholic elementary school as her sibs attended, prior to diagnosis of her LD. She is on medication and that in combination with the LD teachers at her school, is how she is managing to learn and become a successful student.
BTW, if I were to take that statement and turn it around and personalize it to you and your personal and professional life, you would be running to the moderators screaming abuse. And that statement can be easily turned around to do just that. You need to be cognizant of what a personal attack looks like and be respectful of Jim Rob's forun. Please: NO profanity, NO personal attacks, NO racism or violence in posts applies to all of us, including those that disagree with others.
Sorry to hi-jack the thread - reprimanding off.
ping
"Are these kids in daycare and pre-schools? Are there moms working outside the home from early ages?"
Both of my children went to daycare. One was ADD and one wasn't. Both raised by the same parents, attended the same church, and taught in the same school system, often by the same teachers.
"Let's look at how children are raised by the members of our church."
1 & 2: Both seem to be pretty much common sense to me. We did both, except we generally do NOT expect the very youngest to stay queit all the way through church, especially an infant. I'm not real sure about the purpose of having infants in the church service.
"3) The mothers being teaching their children in infancy how to be quiet. Every day they line their children up on the sofa..."
Can't say as I ever did this, at least not every day.
"4) They establish a routine of morning, evening, and mealtime prayer and daily scripture reading. ( During these times the children are expected and encouraged to be quiet and non-disruptive.)"
More "organized" prayer than we do in our household but to each his own.
"4a)They have set meal times and no snacking between meals."
I can't agree with the necessity of this at all. Especially not if the snacks are healthy ones. What is the purpose of this?
"5) These children have regular nap times."
As did mine.
"Do we have ADHA in our congregation. Yes! It is **only** with older children who have parents who have converted to the religion..."
Hard to believe. But
"Ok,,,I am waiting for an ADHA/ADD defender to call me abusive!"
What is an ADD/ADHD defender? Do you think we're delusional because we believe ADD/ADHD is real in some kids (although I DO believe it's overdiagnosed). And I would never call you abusive, at least not based on this post.
I find that VERY difficult to believe.
I have no idea whether the parents did anything illegal, but I have to question their wisdom, and I almost can't even do that. Their sorrow has to be more than I could imagine. But the saddest part is that a beautiful life was lost.
I find that VERY difficult to believe.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I am not waiting for the "education industrial complex" to investigate it. It would mean less funding for the complex.
Ditto for the "medical/social-welfare-complex" as well.
Follow the money.
Please: NO profanity, NO personal attacks, NO racism or violence in posts applies to each of us, including you and including me.
Bookmark for later review of unintended consequences and how they bite you in the....never mind. Not the way to phrase it on this one.
There are a number of other considerations. A proper diagnosis and treatment process should continually look to uncover co-existing and contributing factors. Some of them include sleep disorders, depression, food allergies. But it should never be looked at as an either/or equation. Many times things co-exist and improvement in one area may lessen overall symptoms or certain symptoms but it doesn't mean they have found the one true problem.
Too often, the professional is merely concerned about behavior. I believe that most ADHD children can be taught to behave even without medication. The issue for their ability to learn isn't changed yet the outward behavior seems normal.
Agreed this one is very sad, but also atypical. I don't see how anybody can diagnose ANY child with ADHD and bi-polar that young. I hesitate to blame tyhe parents because they've lost something very precious, but there's just no way a child should take these kinds of medications.
The only "strawman" in what SBMV had to say is the one in your imagination.
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