Kids on ADHD Medication More Likely to Be Bullied, Study Says.

Advanced Back & Neck Pain Center Blog Kids on ADHD Medication More Likely to Be Bullied, Study Says.

The study found that not only were prescription stimulant medications, such as Adderall or Ritalin, some of the most misused, shared or “diverted” drugs, but that children on ADHD medication are more likely to targeted to have their medication stolen or coerced into giving it away. The study also showed that these children that had their medication taken away from them, or had willingly given it away, were four and a half more times likely to be bullied.

When you combine this with the fact that nearly 1 in 10 children is now likely to be diagnosed with an attention disorder, and that prescription medication for ADHD has spiked 27% between 2007 and 2011, it can make for a pretty scary stastistic. Read the full article here.

So if you’re a parent of a child who is prescribed medication for ADHD or a similar attention disorder, what can you do? First, have a regular conversation with your children about the fact that sharing medication is illegal and can hurt people. Sometimes children see it as a medicine, and the idea of sharing medicine doesn’t necessarily have a negative connotation to it.
 
Get their spine checked! One of our favorite research articles is this one published by Dr. Anthony Bastecki in the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics. It discusses a 5 year old patient who was on three different medications for his ADHD. His mother brought him to the chiropractor who found that he had an abnormal spinal alignment in his neck. After working with the chiropractor for 8 weeks, the child’s symptoms had improved so much that the pediatrician removed him from all of the medications!
 
So will chiropractic help get every child with ADHD off their medications? No. But it is an avenue that is overlooked by the majority of patients, and one that might help a lot of families.
Please let us know if there are any children with ADHD in your life that you would like have evaluated by us.





*Individual Results May Vary
Author
Dr. Travis McKay

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