Do you think doctors rush to judgement over ADHD?

Another problem that presents with the same symptoms as ADD/ADHD is lack of sleep. I forget just what huge percentage of young children are sleep deprived. I always observed when my kids were little that the tireder they were, the faster they went, as if to keep themselves awake. The doctors I am around are not so quick to say that a child has ADD and neither are the teachers. Mostly in my area there is a strong tendency to want a child to be at least seven and a half years old before there is any talk of medicine. They also like for the child to receive counselling or behavioral therapy along with the meds, if there are any prescribed. That is not to say that everyone in my area is perfect, but just that I am not running into the problem of overmedication as much. I work with special needs children, and adult disabled as well.

I personally think one shouldnt be diagnosed until a later age. A child will be all over the place being hyper and such until around the age of 7-8. If a child isnt doing well in school because he/she can't function then thats when the child should be diagnosed. Until then, kids will be well, kids!

Yes I absolutely do think it's over-diagnosed nowadays. I suspect that if my daughter (who's now 27) was a small child today she may well have been classified as ADHD by some over-zealous doctor. I can think of many children I knew when I was younger who could also possibly have been classified in the same way and all have grown into perfectly average adults. The thing that puzzles me - well, actually it really annoys me! - is parents that just seem hell-bent on getting some kind of "tag" attached to their kids. I used to have a lot of dealings in an official capacity with people like that and some of the parents just could not accept that their child's behaviour was normal, unruly perhaps, but still normal. It's a shame for people that do have a genuine problem because nowadays, here in the UK at least, ADHD has become one of those conditions that people tend to roll their eyes and say "okaaay" when they hear about it.

I can only comment on my own child's diagnoses and I think it was a great call not by just her Doctor, but first and foremost her teacher and myself. I knew she did not pay attention to anything, unlike her older sister, but I thought like all siblings she was just a different child. It wasn't until she got into 1st grade did I first find out yes, there was a problem. My child did not have any of the information she should have received from kindergarten unlike her classmates. What was worse she was not getting any of the information from that year either. She was then, as now, a well-behaved child, but was not learning. So we decided it clearly fit ADD and then I went to her doctor about it. He gave the teacher and I a questionnaire to fill out about my child. We did not do them together and I never seen what she wrote. Sadly when I returned to the doctors where he had already compared them, they matched 100%. She has been on concerta since and is going on her second year of it. She not only caught up, but also is now excelling beyond her classmates and is assisting the teacher in helping them. So in my case it was a very correct diagnoses. So I let the parent(s), teacher and the docotor judge whether or not it's correct. They would be the ones to know first hand what is going on with the child exactly.

i contribute alot to over diagnosis. but i also feel that diet has alot to do with it. i truely think if food got back to basics we wouldn't have as many issues with this particular disorder. i know that dr's recommend cutting out certain additives and dyes in food first. i also know that in todays age it's hard to eat more natural. i refused to allow anyone to label my older son. many would consider him attention deficit in many capacities, but i truely feel that with proper attention, care, and diet most children do not need this diagnosis or medication. now i'm not saying that's the case with all of them, tho the majority don't need medical interventions.

Yes I do and I peronally know of few cases (even a 3 year old who just had 2 new baby brothers twins and moved from one state to another and was playing up huge time he was diagnose with ADHD and put on meds but turned out he was just playing up because of all the changes in his life). I dont think its just the case of ADHD I think they do it for many other conditions. My son was diagnosed with mild autism with a consultation of 10 min with the speach pathologist and she wrote a report that made it sound as if my son was a total vegetable. I recently heard on tv that 20 years ago 1 child in over 4000 was diagnosed with autism now the number is 1 in 167 (or something like that). My opinion is that if a chils shows one "simptom" the automaticly assume its adhd and most often than not put the poor kid on very strong medication. they are handing them out like lollies thise days.