article on the difference in brain function ADHD and typical

I thought this article was very interesting. Seems to me that what we call ADHD has definite components that are more like an LD.

Beth

I think in some cases adhd definitely causes symptoms of LD. A prime example would be my younger child who was tested as severely perceptually impaired, had all the signs of dyslexia, and significant memory issues. Upon being further tested with another dr the adhd was found. With medication was retested by the first dr and no longer tested perceptually impaired!

I found this quote from the article most interesting: “”If I had to make a prediction,’ Vickers offers, ‘I’d say the kids taking medication and also training this way might grow neural networks that are more efficient at transporting information between the long- and short-duration systems.’”

If Vickers is correct, the children who make the most gains will be those whose parents take a balanced approach that includes both medication and what we currently refer to as “alternative” therapies. Perhaps a better name would be “complementary” therapy.

4-12 percent? duh? What a load of crap. Thats a pretty wide range. That first statement alone should tell you that the article is BS.

OK how many kid have LD 4% or 12%? If they don’t know that then they know nothing.

Stimulants cause a reduction in bloodflow, neural activity, and dendritic connections in ALL brains and especially the brains of children.

The reason for the range-estimate of impact is because as yet we have not surveyed all children in enough regions to make a better guesstimate. It is not “a load of crap” as you so eloquently put it, it is an acknowledgment of the limited data we currently have on which to work.

It will be very expensive and time consuming to conduct the quality of studies needed to better identify true incidence. Until then we unfortunately have only school records and select small studies to rely upon. The schools are inconsistant in their reporting, and the small studies are not large enough to generalize acorss the whole nation.

I do find it interesting that our troll chose to pick such a small part of the article to focus on. I suppose the fact that this study is the second now which shows a very definite difference in the functioning of the brain in people with ADD is inconsequential to his thinking. And just a couple weeks back he was arguing that it is impossible to clinically diagnose ADD…

Absence of proof is not synonymous as proof of absence.

Eventually, we will learn enough to be better able to make proper diagnosis of conditions like ADD, autism, etc. Until then, the subjective means we have currently will just have to do.

When you are dealing with a normally distributed population — which almost all human questions are — and you label one part of it as extreme, then there will *always* be a question of where you draw the line to cut off extreme from hig or low normal, and there will *always* be a range of incidence rates depending on how strictly you interpret the cutoff line.
People who make a big issue out of this are demonstrating their ignorance.

http://brainplace.com/bp/atlas/ch12.asp

thanks dad for posting the article.

Makes me wonder about the vision therapy component.

Swimming, puzzles and putting,eh? Its been swimming, gymnastics and horse backing in our case. All with a body position and balance component. Which brings up the Neuronet/Pace type training others have been doing.

I feel that we are so much closer to having more answers. It going to be interesting.

Jen, thanks for the link. Our ADHD-Is-Just-A-Big-Conspiratorial-Hoax- Perpetrated-Upon-Us-By-The-Pharmaceutical-Industry “Guest” seems to think that the diagnosis of ADHD has zero scientific basis, and that those believed to have it are simply “spirited”. Those of us who live with it in ourselves or our children know otherwise. The article is just reassurance of what we already are intuitively aware of—it is real, it is quantifiable.