Reply to S/O - not agreeing on ADHD Medication

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[quote=Anonymous]Much of the criticism surrounding brain imaging research is that the studies have not adequately controlled for prior medication use so that there is no way to discern if the differences are due to brain development or the effects of medication.

http://psychrights.org/research/Digest/NLPs/neruoimagingupdate.pdf
"We pointed out the difficulty in drawing meaningful conclusions from this
body of research because of a significant confounding variable: prior or current
medication use by the ADHD patients. As we documented, in the large
majority of ADHD neuroimaging studies, researchers have compared brain
scans from normal control subjects to brain scans from medicated ADHD
subjects. This makes it difficult to know if between-group differences
reported by researchers might result from an idiopathic organic brain defect
— as implied or stated in most studies — or from brain changes resulting
from prior drug use by the subjects diagnosed with ADHD. Critics over the
past decade pointed out that prior medication use constitutes an important
potential confounding variable that limits the validity of these studies, but
most researchers have continued to use medicated patients in their studies,
sometimes without acknowledgement of the issue."

PP is correct that MRIs are not a valid diagnostic tool as cautioned by the researchers in the articles PP cited.

The genetic marker research is very preliminary. I hope that if such a test ever does become available, it can help differentiate between those that really require medicine to function vs. those who are occasionally "day dreamy".  My concern is how all people labeled with ADHD are lumped into one big category. Even though there are the subtypes in the DSM, the treatment is the same.

In my ideal world, ADHD medication would be used with extreme caution. There is always a risk vs. benefit analysis that needs to be done when considering taking any medication - especially those that have known risks and are used over a long period of time on children with developing brains.
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