Loading practices
Loading practices
Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Exercise, food and other supports
Convergence problems, where the eyes struggle to work together on something close up, are a little more common in ADHD and deserve treating in their own right. Reading is another matter. Eyes cross a line in small jumps, and the skipping seen in dyslexia comes from how language is processed rather than from how the eyes travel, which is why training the eyes leaves the reading where it was.
the daylight so that you can see (Quran 10:67). Seeing has been provided for, and the difficulty in reading sits further in than the eyes.
يونس
هُوَ ٱلَّذِي جَعَلَ لَكُمُ ٱلَّيۡلَ لِتَسۡكُنُواْ فِيهِ وَٱلنَّهَارَ مُبۡصِرًاۚ إِنَّ فِي ذَٰلِكَ لَأٓيَٰتࣲ لِّقَوۡمࣲ يَسۡمَعُونَ
It is He who made the night so that you can rest in it and the daylight so that you can see- there truly are signs in this for those who hear
Qur’an 10:67read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
When many approaches are compared inside one analysis, the alternatives tend to fall behind. A network meta-analysis set pharmacological, psychological and complementary interventions against each other, and stimulants outperformed the dietary and alternative options on ADHD symptoms. That is a statement about averages across trials rather than about any particular child.
Catalá-López F, Hutton B, Núñez-Beltrán A, Page MJ, Ridao M, Macías Saint-Gerons D, Catalá MA, Tabarés-Seisdedos R, Moher D. (2017). The pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatment of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in children and adolescents: A systematic review with network meta-analyses of randomised trials.. PloS one doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Training the eyes cannot fix a difficulty that was never in the eyes.
Peripheral biofeedback, the sort that tracks skin conductance and heart rate rather than brainwaves, has more behind it than neurofeedback does. You practise letting the body drop into a calmer state while a monitor shows you it happening.
The fair test for anything offered alongside medication is whether it adds something on top. In one small imaging study, cognitive training added to a stimulant left inhibition no better than the stimulant on its own.
Saying that something does not work leaves a parent holding the same worry that sent them looking in the first place. Say what the time and money would buy instead, and put exercise at the top of the list.