Survey of 2500 families finds what ADHD treatments seem to work/ not work as applied in the real world

By Dr. David Rabiner | December 17, 2020

While care­ful­ly con­trolled clin­i­cal tri­als are essen­tial for estab­lish­ing sci­en­tif­ic sup­port for dif­fer­ent ADHD treat­ments, it is also impor­tant to exam­ine how par­ents feel about the treat­ments they actu­al­ly select for their child. How par­ents feel about ADHD treat­ments they have tried for their child pro­vides an impor­tant com­ple­ment to pub­lished clin­i­cal tri­als data, and can…

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On neurons, lifelong learning, meditation, humility, “empty brain calories” and more

By SharpBrains | October 30, 2020

Wel­come to a new edi­tion of Sharp­Brains’ e‑newsletter, fea­tur­ing 12 fas­ci­nat­ing neu­ro­science find­ings and open questions–and the beau­ti­ful image above. #1. “With this image I want to illus­trate the large advances made in imag­ing meth­ods over the past cen­tu­ry, allow­ing mod­ern neu­ro­sci­en­tists to look at neu­rons in ways that Cajal could have only dreamed of.” –…

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What should come first to treat ADHD in children, behavior therapy or stimulant medication?

By Dr. David Rabiner | October 7, 2020

Stim­u­lant med­ica­tion treat­ment and behav­ior ther­a­py are cur­rent­ly the two child ADHD treat­ments with the strongest research sup­port. How­ev­er, when par­ents begin treat­ment for their child, or when pro­fes­sion­als are ini­ti­at­ing treat­ment with a new client, there is no research to guide the deci­sion of which approach to begin with. Is it bet­ter to start with…

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Initial study finds promise and limitations in using virtual reality (VR) to treat ADHD

By Dr. David Rabiner | May 9, 2018

___ Giv­en the lim­i­ta­tions of exist­ing evi­­dence-based ADHD treat­ments, i.e., stim­u­lant med­ica­tion and behav­ior ther­a­py — research on nov­el inter­ven­tion approach­es con­tin­ues to be impor­tant. Cog­ni­tive train­ing is one such approach that has been sug­gest­ed as a poten­tial adjunct or even replace­ment for med­ica­tion treat­ment. While cog­ni­tive train­ing takes dif­fer­ent forms, e.g., com­put­er­ized atten­tion training,…

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Consistent use of ADHD medication may stunt growth by 2 inches, large study finds

By Dr. David Rabiner | March 16, 2018 |

___ The Mul­ti­modal Treat­ment Study of ADHD (MTA Study) is the largest ADHD treat­ment study ever con­duct­ed — near­ly 600 7–9‑year-old chil­dren with ADHD were ran­dom­ly assigned to one of four inter­ven­tions: 1) Care­ful­ly mon­i­tored med­ica­tion treat­ment; 2) Inten­sive behav­ior ther­a­py; 3) Med­ica­tion Treat­ment com­bined with Behav­ior Ther­a­py; or 4) Com­mu­ni­ty Care (par­ents obtained what­ev­er treatment…

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Studies reinforce the critical importance of ADHD treatment monitoring

By Dr. David Rabiner | August 22, 2017

__________ As the new school year approach­es, let me high­light the essen­tial val­ue of ADHD treat­ment mon­i­tor­ing. Even when a child’s treat­ment has been going well, response to treat­ment can change over time. This is true for med­ica­tion treat­ment, or any oth­er treat­ment a child is receiv­ing. By reg­u­lar­ly mon­i­tor­ing how a child is doing…

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