Source: Cornea  |  Posted 8 years ago

By Paula Moyer

SAN DIEGO, CA -- October 31, 2006 -- Children with attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) require fewer office visits and are less likely to be on multiple medications if their parents receive behavioral training, according to a presentation here at the 53[^]rd[] annual meeting of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP).

"Training parents has an additional additive value to routine medical care in the treatment of ADHD," said Barbara J. van den Hoofdakker, MA, clinical researcher, department of psychiatry, University of Groningen University Medical Center, Groningen, The Netherlands. "In our study children who received only routine clinical care required more office visits and were more likely to be on polypharmacy."

Investigators in the university's department of psychiatry conducted their study to assess the effectiveness of behavioral parent training as an adjunct to ongoing routine clinical care in the treatment of ADHD. They recruited 94 children who were 4 to 12 years old and had been diagnosed with ADHD. The investigators randomly assigned 47 children and their parents to behavioral training plus routine care and 47 children to routine care alone.

The group receiving the intervention had training sessions with a therapist that focused on education regarding ADHD and effective ways to respond to their children's behavioral problems. The group receiving routine care had access to family support and medical treatment when appropriate. The investigators monitored the children's medication, office visits, and calls to the office.

Unlike many other ADHD studies, the investigators did not exclude cormorbid conditions; among these children 82 (87%) had comorbid conditions. The investigators wanted to know if the intervention affected parent-reported ADHD-symptoms, behavioral problems, internalizing problems, and parenting stress.

Although parents in both groups reported improvements over time on all measures, the intervention was superior to routine care in reducing behavioral and internalizing problems, the researcher said in the presentation on October 26[^]th[]. For pure ADHD symptoms and parental stress, the groups had similar results. The children in the control arm had more office visits and were more likely to use multiple medications.

[Presentation title: Parent Training for Children With ADHD: Effectiveness in Routine Care. Abstract C46]