As Coronavirus continues to plague the world, Schooling at home is challenging, even if your child is participating in a hybrid school approach. If your child struggles with an attention disorder, it could be even more demanding. Chiropractic care may help to alleviate some of your child’s issues.

Let’s back up a smidge. If you’re not sure that your child has an attention disorder, take a look at the ADHD diagnosis.

“ADHD is marked by deficiencies of certain neurotransmitters or chemicals in the brain. As research into the disorder has increased, awareness of the condition has risen, too. It was the most googled medical condition in the first half of 2018.

‘ADHD has become common terminology. It has become part of the culture as well as part of the medical world,’ explains Peter Conrad, PhD, a sociologist at Brandeis University who has researched ADHD since 1975.

There are three types of ADHD: inattentive, hyperactive/impulsive, and a combined type. There is no medical test to identify the disorder, so it's diagnosed based on symptoms seen over at least 6 months. Diagnoses come from a comprehensive evaluation by a licensed clinician, such as a pediatrician or psychologist, who looks for a series of characteristics on a checklist.

While it’s not uncommon for children to sometimes show behaviors like wandering off task; struggling to focus and pay attention; fidgeting; being restless, hyperactive, or talking too much; and getting easily frustrated; the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) says when someone has ADHD, these characteristics are ‘chronic or long-lasting, impair the person’s functioning, and cause the person to fall behind normal development for his or her age.’

The NIMH says symptoms can appear in children as young as 3 to 6, but plenty of people aren’t diagnosed until they are teens or adults. The agency says symptoms ‘can be mistaken for emotional or disciplinary problems or missed entirely in quiet, well-behaved children.’

‘There is a common perception that ADHD is over-diagnosed in the United States, but a previous study ... indicated that this perception was not supported by available scientific evidence,’ study researcher Wei Bao, MD, PhD, an assistant professor in the College of Public Health at the University of Iowa, says.” [i]

Medication is readily available to help combat the symptoms of the disorder, many believe that medications are being relied on too heavily. An October 2018 study that reviewed global medication use for ADHD found the use of medication for attention disorders is on the rise. The report discovered an increase in the use of stimulant and nonstimulant medications to treat ADHD in 13 countries that were part of a retrospective, observational study of more than 150 million people.

The authors note that there were significant geographic differences. In places like Japan, which rely more heavily on alternative medicines, rates of medication prescriptions were lower while rates of medication prescriptions were higher in the United States, where alternative medicine is not the norm. The authors suggest that this should be a cautionary note for clinicians relying on Western medicine only to make sure they aren’t over-diagnosing and medicating children.

In many places where alternative medicine is relied on more heavily, parents turn to chiropractic, meditation techniques, dietary adjustments, exercise, and acupuncture/accupressure to help alleviate ADHD symptoms and quiet the mind.

If you’d like to see how chiropractic care can help you or your child with attention disorders, check out GulphMillsChiro.com, or call 484-751-5037 to schedule a complimentary initial assessment.

[i] Jennifer Clopton, https://www.webmd.com/add-adhd/news/20181126/adhd-rising-in-the-us-but-why