University of Virginia Health System

U.VA. RESEARCHERS MEASURE ATTENTION DISORDER

Unlike diabetes or hypertension, there is currently no way to measure ADHD objectively, said Dr. Daniel Cox, director of U. Va.'s Behavioral Medicine Center and principal investigator of the study.

Until now, doctors have had to rely on subjective observations to diagnose ADHD, he said. As a result, medications for ADHD, such as Ritalin, may be overprescribed for children who do not actually have the condition.

A study in today's Journal of the American Medical Association reported a rapid increase in prescriptions of Ritalin for children age two to four between 1991 and 1995. A recent survey by the Center for Pediatric Research found, in the Virginia cities of Portsmouth and Virginia Beach, 10 percent of public school children in grades two through five were taking ADHD medication.

Three to five percent of American children exhibit ADHD symptoms, according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, published by the American Psychiatric Association. Of all child referrals to mental health services, one-third to one-half are due to ADHD, Cox said.

Cox and researchers from Sweet Briar College in Virginia developed a unique brain wave measurement model based on research at NASA's Langley Porter laboratories to measure the brain waves of fighter jet pilots. The test senses changes that occur when subjects shift their attention from one task to another.

In pilot studies, we have seen that the brain wave activity of a non-ADHD child is stable when the child moves his attention from one task to another. By contrast, the brain waves of children with ADHD are very chaotic when they are shifting to another task, Cox said. We hope the current study, which is larger, will confirm the earlier pilot study results.

A $64,153 grant from the Virginia Commonwealth Health Research Board is funding the study.

February 23, 2000