Testing for ADHD

See Alan Yellin, PhD's video on Testing for ADHD...
Testing for ADHD | Kids in the House
KidsInTheHouse the Ultimate Parenting Resource
Kids in the House Tour

Testing for ADHD

Comment
69
Like
69
Transcription: 
There are, generally, three things that we do to test for ADHD. The first thing we want to do, and get from parents, is a good parental history. That is, what was this child like when they were two. What was this child like when they were in Preschool. What were they like when they started Kindergarten. What did we see? Was the child easily able to go to bed at night? Were there a lot of curtain calls? Where they the child that had a hard time settling down? Were they the child in school that was unable to sit down during rug time and hear a story when all the other children were? We like to get a good history. Secondly, we like to give parent rating forms and teacher rating forms. Most of these are normed to within three months of the age of the child. I like to particularly pay attention to teacher rating forms because the teacher is the only person who sees the child every day, compared to 20 other students. The last thing that we do is some testing. We like to do some testing, because many learning disabilities also resemble Attention Deficit Disorder, as well as, kids with Attention Deficit Disorder, also have some learning disabilities. If we are going to treat the whole child, we need to know how the child is doing educationally; how they are doing with their concentration and attention. Then we get a nice picture about whether or not this child does or does not have Attention Deficit Disorder. Most importantly, what are the compensatory strategies that we can put in place so this child can achieve in life.

See Alan Yellin, PhD's video on Testing for ADHD...

Transcript

Expert Bio

More from Expert

Alan Yellin, PhD

Psychologist

Dr. Alan Yellin is a licensed psychologist as well as licensed marriage and family therapist.  He has been in practice for over 30 years working with children, adolescents and adults. Dr. Yellin did his post-doctoral fellowship at Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles. In his practice, he sees children with learning problems, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, fears and social skills issues. Additionally, he has a sub-specialty in working with children from divorced families as well as helping parents deal more effectively with their divorce. Dr. Yellin’s practice also includes working with adolescents and adults with depression, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive issues as well as issues around life passages. Dr. Yellin believes that therapy works best when the client and therapist have a collaborative relationship as they explore thoughts and feelings and work towards solutions, and uses a combination of scientific data along with humor to help people achieve change. He is in a long-term happy marriage and has two grown children.

More Parenting Videos from Alan Yellin, PhD >
Enter your email to
download & subscribe
to our newsletter