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Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Medication and how it works
A worry built on a half remembered article tends to dissolve once you find out what was actually studied. A worry that comes from your values, about what you want for your child or what you think someone should have to manage alone, does not dissolve and should not be argued away. That one needs a decision made with your eyes open. Public feeling about these drugs has been shaped by organised campaigning as well as by evidence, which is worth knowing when you trace where a fear came from.
This explains how treatments work. Never start, stop or change a medication because of something you read here.
'Has God given you permission [to do this], or are you inventing lies about God?' (Quran 10:59). A prohibition you have placed on yourself deserves to be checked for where it came from.
يونس
قُلۡ أَرَءَيۡتُم مَّآ أَنزَلَ ٱللَّهُ لَكُم مِّن رِّزۡقࣲ فَجَعَلۡتُم مِّنۡهُ حَرَامࣰ ا وَحَلَٰلࣰ ا قُلۡ ءَآللَّهُ أَذِنَ لَكُمۡۖ أَمۡ عَلَى ٱللَّهِ تَفۡتَرُونَ
Say, ‘Think about the provision God has sent down for you, some of which you have made unlawful and some lawful.’ Say, ‘Has God given you permission [to do this], or are you inventing lies about God?’
Qur’an 10:59read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
A study of why young people come off ADHD medication found the reasons clustered around side effects, a sense that the need had changed, and the attitudes of the family around them. Family attitude sat there beside the medical reasons. What people believe about a drug shapes what happens almost as much as the drug does.
Wong IC, Asherson P, Bilbow A, Clifford S, Coghill D, DeSoysa R, Hollis C, McCarthy S, Murray M, Planner C, Potts L, Sayal K, Taylor E. (2009). Cessation of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder drugs in the young (CADDY)--a pharmacoepidemiological and qualitative study.. Health technology assessment (Winchester, England) doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Information fixes a misunderstanding and does nothing for a value, so it helps to know which you have.
Before anyone concludes that medication does not work for you, check what dose was actually reached. Doses in general practice often stay lower than a specialist would use, and a fair share of so called non responders respond once the dose goes up.
Unmanaged ADHD wrecks sleep, food and movement, and wrecked sleep, food and movement make the attention worse the next day. The loop feeds itself, which is also the hopeful part: a small repair anywhere in it pays back more than it should.
The growth effect is usually small: something like a couple of pounds and a centimetre or two less than expected in the first year or two, with most children catching up afterwards. Knowing the size of it helps, because both blank reassurance and quiet dread are worse than the actual number.