This article from Sciencentral News discusses a study by Andrea Chronis, a psychologist at the University of Maryland
“A new study is showing that the parents of ADHD children may also have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.” The article is good but this sentence is not, professionals who deal with ADDers have known about adult ADD for decades, unfortunate not everyone else knows. Yet.
The article includes comments about Lew Mills, a therapist in San Francisco. Lew’s got some great articles on ADD on his website. Have a look.
What we found is that for children who have ADHD, the parents are 24 times more likely to have ADHD themselves during childhood.
The study also showed that when kids with ADHD also suffer from other serious behavioral problems, their parents are two to five times more likely to suffer from problems such as depression, anxiety and drug addictions.
Chronis believes the answer is not just to treat the ADHD child, but that child’s whole family. “It’s a bit naive for us to think that treating the child with stimulant medication is going to address all of the problems that exist in the family,” says Chronis, who suggests looking at treatments that combine medication with “psycho-social interventions that are looking at helping the child and the family function more optimally, helping the child to function more optimally in the school setting and also helping the child to be successful socially with their peers.”
They suggest it’s crucial to treat the whole family not just the child. Logically that makes sense, nearly everyone will agree that the entire family environment is important on a child’s development.
I wonder though, how often this actually happens? I’m wondering if it’s standard practice for the people who are treating the child for ADD, to also routinely screen the parents for ADD and comorbid disorders and deal with the whole family. It would otherwise be sort of like trying to help a plant grow more without taking into account the surrounding ecosystem.
I wonder how many children and adults with ADD just use medication(s) to manage it? This is not to say meds aren’t useful, they can be extremely useful, but as Dr. Ed Hallowell, author of Delivered from Distraction says, meds can be helpful, but “pills don’t teach skills”
80-85% of adults with ADD don’t know they have it. What are the consequences of an adult with undiagnosed and untreated ADD raising an ADD child? Would they be exponential if the child who had ADD was not diagnosed?