The holiday season is often accompanied by a unique set of stresses and pressures. For families of children who have ADD or ADHD, these seasonal stresses can verge on the overwhelming.

To help families have the happiest possible holidays, BellaOnline's ADD editor, Erika Lynn Smith, offered the following tips:

• Choose carefully what you and your family is involved in over the holiday season. One does not have to attend or accept every invitation that comes along. Life is short, decide who or what is important and then graciously decline those invites you do not feel will do anything but cause additional stress and disorder in life.

• Keep it simple and low key whenever possible. Most people with ADD are sensitive to lights, sounds, textures. A busy, crowded shopping center may soon cause sensory overload, leading to irritability, and decreasing ones ability to focus on finding what he or she came for in the first place.

• If feeling overwhelmed, remember to take care of your needs first, everything else can wait. Often we place the most outrageous demands on ourselves, pushing ourselves to the brink of exhaustion, determined to make this the best birthday, holiday, party. The reality is we end up tired, irritable, and unable to enjoy what we worked so hard to achieve in the first place.

Labels: tips, stress, holidays

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Research published by the American Psychological Association has found a link between omega-3 fatty acids and improved nervous-system function. The fatty acids appear to help animals avoid sensory overload.

"The finding connects low omega-3s to the information-processing problems found in people with schizophrenia; bi-polar, obsessive-compulsive, and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorders; Huntingtons disease; and other afflictions of the nervous system." [Source: ScienceDaily]

The key finding focused on two specific omega-3s, ScienceDaily reported: docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA). The body, however, cant make these nutrients, but must instead convert them from a-linolenic acid (LNA) or from supplements.

Labels: research, treatment, sensory overload

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The controversy has raged for years. On one side of the debate are parents and kids who say neurofeedback has improved symptoms in everything from ADHD to depression. On the other side are those who believe the costly therapy is, at best, a placebo, and at worst, a waste of money.

According to a Washington Post article, a resolution to this debate may be nearing:

Both sides may soon get more clarity. The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is sponsoring the first government-funded, peer-reviewed study to put heady claims & to the test, investigating whether the offbeat therapy makes sense for millions of American children and adults coping with ADHD and similar disorders.

Researchers are recruiting 36 participants for the study, which should be completed and the results published by next summer. Participants will range in age from six to 12.

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Researchers have discovered that the anti-seizure drug divalproex may help control overly aggressive behaviors in children with ADHD.

A Dec. 14 Reuters Health article provided the following details about the divalproex study, which conducted at New Yorks Stony Brook University School of Medicine:

• Half of the children received divalproex in addition to their regular ADHD treatment, while half received a placebo, or inactive, pill, plus their usual medications.
• All of the children's families had weekly behavioral therapy.
• Three of the children either left the study before it was completed, or could not be found for follow-up testing.
• Eight of 14 patients in the divalproex group exhibited less aggressive behavior, compared to just 2 of 13 in the placebo group.
• Although the drug was generally well-tolerated, some children taking it experienced feelings of sadness and trouble falling asleep.

The Stony Brook study was published in the December 2009 edition of the American Journal of Psychiatry.

Labels: medications

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Many ADHD specialists recommend behavior therapy for children with ADHD. But parents who heed this advice often find their kids on months-long waiting lists. Now, according to an Dec. 8 post on the News Anchor Mom blog, that wait may get considerably longer for parents in Illinois:

The state [of Illinois] is behind on its payments to speech therapists and developmental therapists by 2-3 months. Many of them are looking for new jobs because they cant pay their bills& If therapists dont start getting paid, [Sarah] Ziemba worries kids will really struggle to get the help they need in a timely manner.

Typically, the younger children are when they start therapy, the better they will do in school.

Labels: therapy

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A survey conducted by the National Institute of Mental Health and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found lower rates of some mental disorders among American youth than have been reported in other published findings. The one exception was ADHD.

This information was revealed in a Dec. 14 release issued by the National Institutes of Health:

• Overall, 13 percent of respondents met criteria for having at least one of the six mental disorders within the last year.
• About 1.8 percent of the respondents had more than one disorder, usually a combination of ADHD and conduct disorder.
• Among the specific disorders, 8.6 percent had ADHD, with males more likely than females to have the disorder.
• 3.7 percent had depression, with females more likely than males to have the disorder.
• 2.1 percent had conduct disorder.
• 0.7 percent had an anxiety disorder (GAD or panic disorder).
• 0.1 percent had an eating disorder (anorexia or bulimia).

"With the exception of ADHD, the prevalence rates reported here are generally lower than those reported in other published findings of mental disorders in children, but they are comparable to other studies that employed similar methods and criteria,"lead author Kathleen Merikangas, Ph.D., said in the release.

Labels: research, mental_health

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New guidelines from the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP) and the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) advise healthcare providers not to use medication as a first-line treatment for children who have Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.

A Dec. 1 article by Jennifer Joseph of the Australian website pharmacynews.com.au provided the following information about the policy change:

RACP chairman David Forbes said the new "multimodal" treatment approach would result in fewer children on drugs. "Treatment may include education, psychosocial strategies, behavioral management and changes in nutrition and medication," he said. &

The draft guidelines, which are awaiting formal consideration from the council of the NHMRC, were released despite relying on the research of a US academic whose integrity was under investigation.

"I am pleased that we can finally provide this more up-to-date information on ways to identify and care for those in our community who may be suffering from ADHD," Federal Health Minister Nicola Roxon said.

Labels: medications, treatment, therapy

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The biopharmaceutical corporation Shire has announced a voluntary recall of six lots of Daytrana, a medication patch used to treat ADHD. According to a Dec. 3 article in the Philadelphia Business Journal, Shire says the recall is not a safety issue, but a functional one:

The company said patients and caregivers could have difficulty removing the liners. Some Daytrana patches do not meet or in the future may not meet their release liner removal specification, the company said.

The company stressed the action is not due to safety issues. "All Daytrana patches can continue to be used unless the release liner cannot be removed or the patches are damaged while being opened," Shire officials said.

In a Dec. 7 article on the website bnet.com, journalist and drug marketing expert Jim Edwards wrote that the latest recall should prompt Shire to end production of Daytrana:

This is the eighth recall of the Daytrana patch, a product on which Shires manufacturer, Noven, makes no profit because recall costs far exceed the revenues it gets from selling the thing, according to Novens most recent 10-Q. Daytranas marketing is already under investigation by the feds.

Its time to say it out loud: The Daytrana ADHD patch does not work, never has done, and should be quietly ditched by Shire and Noven before the FDA wakes up.

Labels: medications, patch, recall

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Sandra F. Rief, MA, has completed a revised guide to her 1997 book, The ADD/ADHD Checklist.

According to a Dec. 7 BusinessWire press release, The ADD/ADHD Checklist: A Practical Reference for Parents and Teachers, 2nd Edition "helps parents and teachers to better understand children and teenagers with attention problems and provide the kind of support and intervention that is crucial to kids success. Presented in a concise, easy-to-read checklist format, the book is packed with practical advice and information."

Key topics include in the revised edition include the difference between ADD, ADHD and AD/HD; behavioral characteristics of ADHD; ADHD look-alikes; positive and effective discipline, and; homework tips for parents.

Labels: parenting, teachers

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A research effort into fruit fly behavior may have yielded insights that can help experts who are studying Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Lia Steakley reported on the fruit fly research and its potential ADHD implications in a Nov. 30 post on Stanford Universitys Scope blog:

In the study, which was led by Caltech postdoctoral fellow Tim Lebestky, researchers exposed flies to a series of brief air puffs and identified flies with an abnormally exaggerated hyperactivity response.

Genetic studies of flies with an exaggerated response revealed a mutation in a dopamine receptor that produced the aberrant behavior. Flies with the mutation were hypersensitive to the air puffs and took much longer to calm down than flies without the mutation.

David Anderson, PhD, an investigator at Caltech's Howard Hughes Medical Institute, explained in a release how these results may benefit ADHD research:

"The findings that flies exhibit emotion-like behavior that are controlled by some of the same brain chemicals as humans opens up the possibility of applying powerful genetics of this 'model organism' to understand how these chemical influence behavior through their actions on specific brain circuits.

While the specific details of where and how this occurs are likely to be different in flies and in humans, the basic principles are likely to be evolutionarily conserved, and may aid in our understanding of what goes wrong in disorders such as ADHD."

Labels: behavior, research, fruit flies

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Training parents of autistic children how better to cope with their offspring's difficult behaviors may also help the children improve, according to a new study in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry:

• Researchers from Yale, Indiana, and Ohio State universities as well as the University of Pittsburgh had parents attend 15 or more hour long sessions over a six-month period.
  
• Parents learned to use positive reinforcement, teach better communication, and other techniques. Behavioral therapists also came to their homes twice a week.
  
• Children of parents enrolled in the program improved more than those children on medication alone.

"Because parents are the agents of change, parent training is less expensive than many other forms of psychosocial interventions," the researchers wrote in their report. "The growing population of children with pervasive developmental disorders makes the availability of effective behavioral interventions an urgent need."

Labels: autism, parenting, training

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Dr. Charles Parker has researched the new ADHD medication Intuniv, and reported his finding in a Nov. 28 post on CorePsych Blog. Intuniv (generic name: guanfacine) is a pill that, in case studies, has remained effective for as long as 24 hours.

"There will be few problems with dosing as Intuniv comes closer to absolute simplicity than many of the other ADHD meds," Dr. Parker wrote. "Most [people] did well at 3mg. The dosage is often weight related, but not always& It has an excellent effect on simple inattentive ADD, just for attention, and is approved by the FDA for ADHD."

Dr. Parker reported that first line indications for Intuniv may include Oppositional Defiant Disorder, anger, frustration, and irritation, in spite of doing well on other ADHD meds.

Intuniv is different than most ADHD medications in that it is not a stimulant. According to a Sep. 6 Medical News Today article, Intuniv is "the first selective alpha-2A adrenergic receptor agonist approved for the treatment of ADHD."

Labels: medications, intuniv

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