seriously guys/Gals. Who's on ADHD meds?

[onetwo_threefour]

I got diagnosed after dropping out of Uni after year one (Dean's vacation) and a history of underperforming to my ability. Went on slow release Ritalin for about 10 years, got me through Mount Royal, my last two years at UofC and my law degree. After I left school, I found that the benefits of medication were minimal in my day to day work even though we tried going on to a different drug for a few months.

As far as side effects, the first week I was on Ritalin, I cleaned my entire house a couple of times and was really intense. That wore off pretty quickly and the only long term side effect I had was a loss of appetite when I was on meds. That didn't help my weight situation since I tended not to eat all day, then overeat at night, but as long as I was better able to focus at school I didn't care...

[DuffMan]

I would venture to guess that I have it to some degree, amongst other things, but I have a don't ask, don't tell policy with my brain, for quite awhile now.

Originally Posted by myst

as a 3rd year medical student, i can say this is just plain wrong. read up on ADHD instead and clinical trials instead. you have no idea what kind of clinical trials and rigorous testing that is done to prove that a drug is effective in treating a condition. the beauty and essence of science is to link cause and effect, not simply correlate two things. in clinical trials, patients ages, diets, race, gender, etc etc are all accounted for and "controlled" using very sophisticated statistical methods so that we are able to accurately say that "drug x does this"; taking care of the interference of other variables

adhd is a condition where parts of the brain are overactive (stimulatory neurons) and others are underactive (inhibitory neurons). a simple way of knowing whether someone has adhd is if you treat them with the medications that have been listed here. all medications that were listed are actually stimulants (derivatives of amphetamine basically). those with adhd have a paradoxical effect of actually decreasing the hyperactivity of the brain and it is thought that is due to an increase in the firing of inhibitory neurons; or it is due to a "densitization" process the cells undergo when exposed to so much stimulation

on the other hand, if you give these stimulatory medications to someone who does not have adhd, the result will be the opposite - patients will be going off the wall, hyperexcitable, flight of ideas, etc etc etc.

1) gluten intolerance is due to a gene polymorphism in some patients that causes hypersensitivity to gluten containing foods. it has absolutely nothing to do with adhd. it has to do with an inflammatory reaction that happens in your bowels because your body thinks that the gluten is "foreign" and tries to "attack" it - causing gastrointestinal problems
2) intestinal candida overgrowth is almost unheard of except in the context of aids patients, those with severely depressed immune systems (like uncontrolled diabetes) or those with rare defects in white blood cells that cannot recognize candida as "foreign"

That is rather short-sighted thinking to disregard the influence of other factors solely due the mechanisms of causation. ie. gluten intolerance is an inflammatory action in your bowels and thus can have no effect on behavior. That to me sounds rather simple.

For the record, I have many MD's that I am very close to and they have said diet changes and in particular gluten intolerance (coeliac disease) can mimic many symptoms of ADHD.

[Raekwon]

Most of these posts are far too long for an ADD thread.

[troutman]

What is the opposite of ADHD? I think I have that.

[myst]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

So the guy finishes off with this:



And your first sentence is this:




What do you mean by that?

It works for him. Are you saying it doesn't work for him?

Probably (hopefully) not, but it sure comes across that way.

he never said he was diagnosed with ADHD

[chid]

Question for you apparent ADHD pros - is ADHD/ADD strictly a North American phenomenon or are there European equivalents?

jw because a friend of mine was teaching in the UK then came back here to teach and was shocked at how many students in Canada have meds for "ADHD" and she had never even heard of it in the UK.

[photon]

Pubmed is a good place to look stuff up.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1994964/

So not much variation between here and other places in the world.

It's an actual medical condition, verified with brain scans.

[troutman]

An older article from 1997:

http://www.mentalhealth.com/mag1/p5m-add2.html

In a major report from the British Psychological Society, British physicians and psychologists are warned not to follow the Canadian and U.S. practice of applying the label attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) to such a wide variety of behaviors in children.

The concept of ADHD is new to most European professionals who tend to use the diagnostic systems of the International Classification of Diseases published by the World Health Organization. "As a consequence, children reaching (or meeting) criteria for hyperkinetic disorder are far less common than those reaching DSM III or DSM IV criteria (in Canada and the U.S.)," the report continued.

The widespread appellation of ADHD in North America to difficult children means that most classrooms, and many families, have children who are so classified. Although ADHD is officially a term for a category of mental disorder, the report said, "it has become so widely used ... that it has a prominent place in the contemporary culture."

[To Be Quite Honest]

Originally Posted by myst

as a 3rd year medical student, i can say this is just plain wrong. read up on ADHD instead and clinical trials instead. you have no idea what kind of clinical trials and rigorous testing that is done to prove that a drug is effective in treating a condition. the beauty and essence of science is to link cause and effect, not simply correlate two things. in clinical trials, patients ages, diets, race, gender, etc etc are all accounted for and "controlled" using very sophisticated statistical methods so that we are able to accurately say that "drug x does this"; taking care of the interference of other variables

adhd is a condition where parts of the brain are overactive (stimulatory neurons) and others are underactive (inhibitory neurons). a simple way of knowing whether someone has adhd is if you treat them with the medications that have been listed here. all medications that were listed are actually stimulants (derivatives of amphetamine basically). those with adhd have a paradoxical effect of actually decreasing the hyperactivity of the brain and it is thought that is due to an increase in the firing of inhibitory neurons; or it is due to a "densitization" process the cells undergo when exposed to so much stimulation

on the other hand, if you give these stimulatory medications to someone who does not have adhd, the result will be the opposite - patients will be going off the wall, hyperexcitable, flight of ideas, etc etc etc.

1) gluten intolerance is due to a gene polymorphism in some patients that causes hypersensitivity to gluten containing foods. it has absolutely nothing to do with adhd. it has to do with an inflammatory reaction that happens in your bowels because your body thinks that the gluten is "foreign" and tries to "attack" it - causing gastrointestinal problems
2) intestinal candida overgrowth is almost unheard of except in the context of aids patients, those with severely depressed immune systems (like uncontrolled diabetes) or those with rare defects in white blood cells that cannot recognize candida as "foreign"

What clinical trials have been done for ADHD people with better diets and healthier living instead of the chemical treatment?

Would you not agree that the biggest factor of our health and our brain's functionality is strictly tied to our diet?

[To Be Quite Honest]

Originally Posted by Bent Wookie

That is rather short-sighted thinking to disregard the influence of other factors solely due the mechanisms of causation. ie. gluten intolerance is an inflammatory action in your bowels and thus can have no effect on behavior. That to me sounds rather simple.

For the record, I have many MD's that I am very close to and they have said diet changes and in particular gluten intolerance (coeliac disease) can mimic many symptoms of ADHD.

Not to mention the ability of absorption through the bowels when they are being affected... But that's not important.

[photon]

Originally Posted by To Be Quite Honest

What clinical trials have been done for ADHD people with better diets and healthier living instead of the chemical treatment?

From the study I linked:

A uniform prevalence rate worldwide also suggests, disappointingly, that geographical variation will not provide fresh clues to the causation of ADHD.

Diet varies with geography, if diet was a factor then prevalence would vary with geography as well.

[To Be Quite Honest]

Originally Posted by photon

From the study I linked:



Diet varies with geography, if diet was a factor then prevalence would vary with geography as well.

It's a nice article that generates interest in our topic but it does not talk specifically about diet, just culture. What foods were eaten by each child and how often (or when).

Interesting that Japan seems to be the lowest affected by ADHD. Japan is known for their healthy fresh diet. However, that is just an observation.

[redforever]

Originally Posted by photon

From the study I linked:



Diet varies with geography, if diet was a factor then prevalence would vary with geography as well.

That is one of the factors affecting diet. Income is another huge factor. Income in turn then determines if one or both parents work in the family. And when both parents work and are so busy, diet is affected as well.

[harmfuljays]

I was diagnosed back in the 80's when it was affectionately referred to as Hyper Activity. Was assigned Desoxyn for quite a few years until I refused to take it. Frankly....as a male, Young boys will be boys we are quite active and need to be properly directed and have that energy channeled. Also education on the condition is quite important. Perhaps maybe all that Cocoa and Tang wasn't a good thing to feed your 10 year old! Put the kids in sports get active in hockey....work out to burn off that extra energy. Learn to meditate. Understanding what makes that extra chemical squirt and learning to control it are all important parts of maturity. Too many times we look to a quick fix when in fact all we need is some common sense and self introspection. I often see adults that have never learned to control it. Some of us like to chase the shiny object. Its ok.

[photon]

Originally Posted by To Be Quite Honest

It's a nice article that generates interest in our topic but it does not talk specifically about diet, just culture. What foods were eaten by each child and how often (or when).

No it doesn't talk specifically about diet, but as mentioned diet varies across culture, everyone keeps on talking about obesity rates in NA compared to other areas.

As the quote says "A uniform prevalence rate worldwide also suggests, disappointingly, that geographical variation will not provide fresh clues to the causation of ADHD." If there was something in the data that showed a clear difference between cultures, then they'd start looking at the differences between cultures and go from there, but the variation wasn't statistically significant enough to even warrant that according to this.

That said a search on pubmed shows many studies relating to diet and ADHD in children.

https://mospace.umsystem.edu/xmlui/b...pdf?sequence=1

Has a bit of a summary with references to some relevant papers.

So it's not something that's ignored, and as you suggest could probably use some more study.

EDIT: More study is good for the future, but we still have to help now as well.

[photon]

Originally Posted by redforever

That is one of the factors affecting diet. Income is another huge factor. Income in turn then determines if one or both parents work in the family. And when both parents work and are so busy, diet is affected as well.

That's true, and on the other end of it culture and income can impact diagnosis as well. A child that has lots of support might not get diagnosed as early or at all. While a child with less support will be in circumstances that will exacerbate the symptoms rather than mask them. Correlation is just correlation, it's easy to read into it.

[Ice]

My son was diagnosed as ADHD in elementary school. Despite that, he wasn't disrespectful in the classroom and was a straight A student so our pediatrician was against medicating him. We decided that medication wouldn't be in order unless his eduation began to suffer. When he started 8th grade it became clear he needed some help to get through the school day. He was put on 30 mg of Vyvanse and it helped him focus in class, remember to write down his homework and he got his grades back up. He didn't feel any different taking it and he wasn't violent or disrespectful so he only took it on school days. This year he started high school and wanted to try school without the medication and he's doing fine and has great grades. I've been told he could outgrow the symptoms that affected his grades and I"m cautiously optimistic this has happened. The medication has some side effects that I'm not fond of, but there was a risk/reward argument to be made when it came to his education.

I'm not sure every active kid has ADD/ADHD, but I know there's a lot teachers could do to help kids keep their act together as young students and many have lacked the ingenuity to handle these kids. They think medication is the easy solution, but that's because it isn't there kid who could potentially be addicted to drugs easier in the future or have their growth stunted, etc. I'd like to see more focus on how to handle ADD/ADHD kids as part of the credential program. We were lucky that my son mostly had great teachers who cared about him and had creative ways of allowing him to burn off energy throughout the day, which for him, was the biggest hurdle.

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by Ice

My son was diagnosed as ADHD in elementary school. Despite that, he wasn't disrespectful in the classroom and was a straight A student so our pediatrician was against medicating him. We decided that medication wouldn't be in order unless his eduation began to suffer. When he started 8th grade it became clear he needed some help to get through the school day. He was put on 30 mg of Vyvanse and it helped him focus in class, remember to write down his homework and he got his grades back up. He didn't feel any different taking it and he wasn't violent or disrespectful so he only took it on school days. This year he started high school and wanted to try school without the medication and he's doing fine and has great grades. I've been told he could outgrow the symptoms that affected his grades and I"m cautiously optimistic this has happened. The medication has some side effects that I'm not fond of, but there was a risk/reward argument to be made when it came to his education.

I'm not sure every active kid has ADD/ADHD, but I know there's a lot teachers could do to help kids keep their act together as young students and many have lacked the ingenuity to handle these kids. They think medication is the easy solution, but that's because it isn't there kid who could potentially be addicted to drugs easier in the future or have their growth stunted, etc. I'd like to see more focus on how to handle ADD/ADHD kids as part of the credential program. We were lucky that my son mostly had great teachers who cared about him and had creative ways of allowing him to burn off energy throughout the day, which for him, was the biggest hurdle.

Believe it or not, I was actually reprimanded at the school I taught at (specifically for kids with learning disabilities/adhd) for not being in my professional attire (Button up longsleeve, slacks) when I gave up my lunchhour to organize a tag football game for the elementary aged kids and changed into my PE strip.

Not 'the' reason I left education, but it was the tipping point in the decision making process.

[Hi-Psi]

I was on Ritalin for years as a kid growing up as I had trouble concentrating in school but eventually decided to stop taking them in Junior High. I often wonder how many kids should ACTUALLY be on these meds.