Are Schools Contributing To Skyrocketing ADHD Diagnoses?

[Kamaji]

Are Schools Contributing To Skyrocketing ADHD Diagnoses? I’m A Pediatrician, And I Think So

We should stopping pushing 5-year-olds onto ADHD medication and start pushing them to get outside and play.

BY: ADRIAN GATY
MAY 19, 2022

My patient was struggling in the classroom and at home. His teacher complained that he couldn’t complete his math worksheets without frequent interventions to refocus him. His parents were tired of the nightly struggle to get him to sit still long enough to finish his homework. The Vanderbilt forms confirmed what everyone already knew: a classic case of ADHD.

I filled out a letter for parents to give the school to start the formal process of getting him special classroom accommodations (extra time on assignments, special seating near the front, more frequent breaks, and so on). The parents wanted to pursue therapy, but their insurance wouldn’t cover it. I gave them the best tips I could on homework strategies.

We planned to see how the next month or so went with the extra classroom help, and then we would meet back up to see whether they wanted to proceed with a trial of medication. The parents were understandably reluctant, as was I, to start him on any daily medicine. After all, he was only five years old.

Taking the Garden out of Kindergarten
The first English language American kindergarten was opened in 1860 by Elizabeth Peabody. Peabody lectured and lobbied widely to spread the word about the benefits of early childhood education, with great success. Within 20 years of the founding of her first school, there were more than 400 kindergartens dotting the nation. Math worksheets, however, were not on the map.

As rates of early childhood ADHD diagnosis continue to rise, it is instructive to visit with our kindergarten pioneer. Peabody’s portrayal of our first kindergartens could not be further from the lives of America’s youngest students today. Kindergarten has not simply been changed into something different, it has become its own worst nightmare.

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Source:  https://thefederalist.com/2022/05/19/are-schools-contributing-to-skyrocketing-adhd-diagnoses-im-a-pediatrician-and-i-think-so/

[mountaineer]

Reviving this thread to add this tweet I just saw, from a doctor:

GeroDoc
@doc_gero
From a clinician friend of mine:  “I work in mental health. I’m tired of getting yelled at by parents when I tell them their kid isn’t autistic, doesn’t have adhd, and isn’t bipolar, they were just locked away for two years and this is the consequence. A pill ain’t gonna fix it.”
9:08 AM · Jan 19, 2023

NY-dad
@GMarctweets
Replying to @doc_gero
In NYC folks get kids designated early so they get twice the double the resources, 2 x amount of time on exams, easy path to MS/HS and then of course college. Every kid has ADHD yet there is no physical test for this diagnosis, it's all subjective....which of course presents bias

[Hoodat]

Can't get an 'ADD' diagnosis any more.  Everything is now 'ADHD'.  Primarily because there are drugs for 'treating' ADHD, but no drugs for treating 'ADD'.  So they just did away with 'ADD' and rolled all those people (who are not hyperactive) into a category in which they do not belong, all so that Big Pharma can sell more drugs.

[Bigun]

Reviving this thread to add this tweet I just saw, from a doctor:

GeroDoc
@doc_gero
From a clinician friend of mine:  “I work in mental health. I’m tired of getting yelled at by parents when I tell them their kid isn’t autistic, doesn’t have adhd, and isn’t bipolar, they were just locked away for two years and this is the consequence. A pill ain’t gonna fix it.”
9:08 AM · Jan 19, 2023

NY-dad
@GMarctweets
Replying to @doc_gero
In NYC folks get kids designated early so they get twice the double the resources, 2 x amount of time on exams, easy path to MS/HS and then of course college. Every kid has ADHD yet there is no physical test for this diagnosis, it's all subjective....which of course presents bias

This was a problem long before COVID appeared on the scene. I'm glad I went to school before they started drugging kids in order to make them more manageable.

[mountaineer]

... all so that Big Pharma can sell more drugs.

And mom can collect Social Security disability in the child's name.

[GtHawk]

Reviving this thread to add this tweet I just saw, from a doctor:

GeroDoc
@doc_gero
From a clinician friend of mine:  “I work in mental health. I’m tired of getting yelled at by parents when I tell them their kid isn’t autistic, doesn’t have adhd, and isn’t bipolar, they were just locked away for two years and this is the consequence. A pill ain’t gonna fix it.”
9:08 AM · Jan 19, 2023

NY-dad
@GMarctweets
Replying to @doc_gero
In NYC folks get kids designated early so they get twice the double the resources, 2 x amount of time on exams, easy path to MS/HS and then of course college. Every kid has ADHD yet there is no physical test for this diagnosis, it's all subjective....which of course presents bias

Well there is certainly an effort to classify too many children as ADHD, having had experience with the complete opposite with my son who the school was trying to tell us was "slow". Knowing better we scratched up the money to have him independently tested, turns out the "slow" kid was smarter than his teachers  and actually also was ADHD. We took him to an actual expert on ADHD and for a short time yes we did have him on meds to help him until he learned to mostly control his impulses but a major part of getting him on track was to challenge him intellectually. What most of these kids they are claiming to have ADD or ADHD need is work that is on a level with their intelligence and not boring them. Also for the kids, mostly boys, who just can't seem to settle down what is needed is exercise, when I was a kid what the teachers did with a kid who was overactive in class was to send them out to run(unlike the nuns at St. Emydius who tied those kids to their desks).

[GtHawk]

And mom can collect Social Security disability in the child's name.

well it was almost forty years ago when our son was diagnosed and I believe they classified ADHD as a disability even back then but we refused to have our son carry a disabled tag through his life for it. By the time he was in sixth grade our son had a good handle on himself and was doing quite well academically though it took until college for him to get a handle on his social skills

[Hoodat]

well it was almost forty years ago when our son was diagnosed and I believe they classified ADHD as a disability even back then but we refused to have our son carry a disabled tag through his life for it. By the time he was in sixth grade our son had a good handle on himself and was doing quite well academically though it took until college for him to get a handle on his social skills

Same here, except it was autism.  Son is now 18 and in college, but still has a ways to go on social skills.

[jmyrlefuller]

Same here, except it was autism.  Son is now 18 and in college, but still has a ways to go on social skills.

Didn't you blame that diagnosis on a vaccine a while back?

[jmyrlefuller]

I was misdiagnosed with what was then-ADD at the age of 5. I was an eccentric kid, but had no hallmarks of the disorder. The psychologist tried to get me on Ritalin but my parents flatly refused. Since I didn't have any real problems at the time, the issue passed for several years.

It wasn't until 15 that I got a diagnosis of Asperger syndrome. There's no real treatment plan for that and the main detriments it causes are social (so things like job hunting and dating are nightmares). So in 2013 they scrubbed it from the DSM-5 and threw it in with autism, which partially explains the massive spike in diagnoses. The other part is that Asperger's is far more common in boys, so in true 2020s fashion, there's a lot of moving the goalposts and redefining the symptoms to get more intersectional people diagnosed. Plus, whereas Asperger's and ADD were not supposed to be diagnosed together (since the symptoms of one could easily be mistaken for the other without careful examination, as was the case with me), now they do regularly diagnose both so that they can pass out the meds.

[Smokin Joe]

This was a problem long before COVID appeared on the scene. I'm glad I went to school before they started drugging kids in order to make them more manageable.

You and me both!  But when we went there was either a track mounted nun with a wicked yardstick or a principal with a 'board of education' to maintain order. We also had hard playing recesses and chores to do to burn off some of that energy.

Maybe way ahead of the 'doctors giving kids stimulants curve', our folks gave us a heavily polluted cup of coffee in the morning, too.

[Free Vulcan]

Don't know about now, but the FedGov used to give them money for any kid falling under the 'diagnosis'.

So of course then every kid had something.

[Wingnut]

Didn't you blame that diagnosis on a vaccine a while back?

Don't be a dick.  I know it is hard.  But try

[Hoodat]

Didn't you blame that diagnosis on a vaccine a while back?

Personally, no.  I merely pointed out that one occurred right after the other, among other possible factors.  But no post hoc argument was ever offered.  Happy now?