Understanding the Rise in ADHD Diagnoses: 11% of U.S. Children Are Affected

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http://healthland.time.com/2013/04/02/understanding-the-rise-in-adhd-diagnoses-11-of-u-s-children-are-affected/


The rates of U.S. children affected by attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are skyrocketing, according to a recent report, but experts caution that the latest numbers require a bit of decoding.

That information shows that 11% of children ages 4 to 17 were diagnosed with ADHD, a 16% increase since 2007, the last time that researchers at Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) did a comprehensive survey for the prevalence of the neurobehavior disorder. The rise was especially dramatic among boys, with an estimated 1 in 5 boys in high school diagnosed with ADHD. What’s more, about two-thirds of the children diagnosed were treated with stimulant medications that can improve attention but also come with side effects.

Are rates truly climbing at such an alarming rate? Possibly. But many experts believe that’s unlikely...

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To start, the information on ADHD rates came from parents reporting on the diagnosis for their children during telephone interviews. Such reports are useful but not as reliable as the verified diagnoses from medical or school records, says Dr. William Barbaresi, director of the developmental-medicine center at Boston Children’s Hospital.

Second, such records-based data suggests that ADHD rates among children may be somewhere between 7.5% and 9.5%, with boys at the higher end of the range, not 11%. In its previous round of analysis, CDC found that ADHD diagnoses rose by 22% between 2003 and ’07, based on the same telephone surveys of 76,000 families in the U.S., climbing by an average of 3% to 6% each year between 2000 and ’10. But the latest figures, which included responses collected between 2011 and ’12, show a far higher prevalence that hints at classrooms full of hyperactive and impulsive kids. “By definition, ADHD requires that symptoms have to have a significant effect on life,” says Barbaresi. “To say that a tenth of all children have a biologic condition that affects their life enough to call it a disorder just does not make sense.”

If that’s the case, then a significant proportion of these children may also be mistreated with medications that they don’t need. “This report and others raises questions about whether we may not be overdiagnosing ADHD and overusing medications,” says Thomas Power, director of the center for management of ADHD at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

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