Large study finds positive yet mixed results from Akili’s digital therapeutic for kids with ADHD

__ Full pub­li­ca­tion of piv­otal tri­al data out­lines Akil­i’s case for FDA reg­u­la­tion (Mobi­Health­News): “A full tran­script of STARS-ADHD — the piv­otal tri­al of Akili Interactive’s video game-like pedi­atric atten­tion deficit treat­ment — has been pub­lished in The Lancet Dig­i­tal Health jour­nal, pro­vid­ing onlook­ers a clear view of data fuel­ing the dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tic company’s pending…

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Study finds combined pharma + non-pharma treatment most beneficial to help youth with ADHD address long-term academic difficulties

__ Aca­d­e­m­ic dif­fi­cul­ties are one of the most impor­tant adverse con­se­quences of ADHD, and they fre­quent­ly con­tribute to par­ents’ deci­sion to seek treat­ment for their child. Whether treat­ment con­sis­tent­ly yields a pos­i­tive impact on long-term aca­d­e­m­ic suc­cess is thus an impor­tant issue; how­ev­er, the answer to this ques­tion has been some­what controversial.

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Will digital therapeutics complement or replace stimulant medications to address inattention and “silent” cognitive issues?

___ Akili Inter­ac­tive: Dig­i­tal pedi­atric ADHD ther­a­peu­tic per­forms well with or with­out accom­pa­ny­ing stim­u­lant ther­a­py (Mobi­Health News): “Dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tic com­pa­ny Akili Inter­ac­tive has announced the first results of an open-label, mul­ti­site pedi­atric ADHD tri­al pro­vid­ing some patients with the company’s video game-like treat­ment along­side a stim­u­lant med­ica­tion. Accord­ing to the com­pa­ny, both those who received…

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Study: Having ADHD costs $1.1 million in lower lifetime earnings, even when “treated”

 Rel­a­tive­ly few stud­ies have exam­ined the impact of child­hood ADHD on long-term finan­cial out­comes, even though becom­ing self-sup­­port­ing and attain­ing finan­cial inde­pen­dence is an impor­tant devel­op­men­tal task. An espe­cial­ly com­pre­hen­sive look at this issue is pro­vid­ed in a study by Pel­ham et al pub­lished recent­ly in the Jour­nal of Con­sult­ing and Clin­i­cal Psy­chol­o­gy. The Study: Participants…

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FDA clears Trigeminal nerve stimulation (TNS) as ADHD treatment

_____ Although stim­u­lant med­ica­tions are gen­er­al­ly con­sid­ered to be a safe and effec­tive treat­ment for ADHD, not all chil­dren ben­e­fit from this approach. Many par­ents are reluc­tant to begin their child on med­ica­tion and some chil­dren expe­ri­ence unac­cept­able side affects. For these rea­sons, devel­op­ing safe and effec­tive alter­na­tive treat­ments for ADHD remains a pri­or­i­ty. Trigeminal…

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Lack of sleep seen to cause sluggish cognitive tempo (SCT) in adolescents with attention deficits

___ It is esti­mat­ed that up to 75% of youth with ADHD have sleep prob­lems. And, exper­i­men­tal stud­ies that manip­u­late sleep quan­ti­ty have demon­strat­ed a causal link between sleep and ADHD behav­ior in chil­dren. How­ev­er, there has been no pri­or work in which sleep dura­tion has been manip­u­lat­ed in ado­les­cents diag­nosed with ADHD. 

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