Is There a Reliable Adhd Test Diagnostic Methods
How can a doctor or paediatrician tell if a child has ADHD? Are there reliable tools available?
The sad answer is that there is no definitive diagnostic test which will give a positive or negative result for attention deficit disorder. Many people mistakenly believe that there is a quick and easy ADHD test. Would that it were so!
Before we look at how the doctor arrives at the diagnosis, it will perhaps be helpful to look at the latest statistics on ADHD. First, it is a neurological disorder with a strong genetic link. Up to recently it was widely believed that only children (almost all boys) were affected by ADHD. Latest research shows that boys are twice as likely as girls to develop this condition. As regards adults, the rate is about 4.5% of the population and here the ratio between the sexes is evenly spread. Everybody thought that about 5% of the population overall were affected but latest figures put that at 10%. These figures are for the USA.
Many parents rightly believe that hyperactivity and impulsive behaviour may just be a normal childhood hazard. How many of us are multi-taskers and how many of us sometimes blurt out something in an impulsive moment or even interrupt people’s conversations? However, the doctor will be asking questions about how often these incidences happen and how long they have lasted, for example if they have appeared before the age of 7 and if they lasted for more than six months. By further questioning , the doctor can ascertain how much these behaviours are hindering the child’s development in at least TWO spheres of the child’s life. These could be any two of the home, the community, the school classroom and the school playground.
Questionnaires are often used to establish more accurately what the patient’s condition is. There will be a physical examination of the child to exclude a medical condition which might have similar symptoms. There will be questions to answer about the attention deficit – difficulty in doing tasks such as homework, how easily the child is distracted and so on. As regards being hyperactive, the doctor will want to know about how frequent squirming and fidgeting is. How often does the child blurt out answers and butt in on conversations?
There is a questionnaire for the parents too in trying to establish whether there is any history of ADHD in the family or whether the pregnancy was an uneventful one or if there is any stressful situation at home. Once all this info is gathered for the ADHD test, the information is measured against that of normal children to arrive at a correct diagnosis.
Once the diagnosis has been made there will be important decisions about which kind of treatment you should opt for. There is conventional medication with psychostimulant drugs (such as Ritalin, Concerta and Adderall) but these have several serious side effects. You may want to discover more about what kinds of alternative ADHD treatments are available by clicking on the link below this article.
Robert Locke is a Health enthusiast who specializes in Children’s Health. He has written extensively on ADHD.
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