Healthy Skepticism Library item: 4618

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: news

Griffith D.
More women seek help for attention disorders
The Sacramento Bee 2006 Apr 30
http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/story/14249758p-15066687c.html

Notes:

Ralph Faggotter’s Comments:

“ Some attribute trend to greater awareness; others blame psychiatric labeling.”

This sentence sums up where the battle-lines are drawn in this and many other medications related conflicts—

Is the rapidly rising use of legally prescribed amphetamine-like drugs a sign of greater ‘disease awareness’, or simply an excuse to justify a growing trend towards the use of performance enhancing drugs: to help ordinary mortals get through their increasingly impossible days?

Full text:

More women seek help for attention disorders Some attribute trend to greater
awareness; others blame psychiatric labeling.
By Dorsey Griffith — Bee Medical Writer Published 2:15 am PDT Sunday, April
30, 2006 The term “attention deficit hyperactivity disorder” conjures up a
boy who can’t sit still to tie his shoes or read a book without a dose of
stimulant medication.
While boys are most likely to be diagnosed and treated for ADHD, another
demographic is rapidly gaining ground: women.

Among them are stay-at-home moms, female professionals and students who are
taking their symptoms to their doctors’ offices and going home with the same
stimulant drugs at unprecedented rates.

Why women are rapidly falling into the growing ADHD-diagnosed population is
not clear. Some argue that the trend reflects a heightened awareness among
women of long-ignored symptoms and doctors’ willingness to treat them.

Others say it represents the “medicalization,” or psychiatric labeling, of
an otherwise normal condition that results from living in a society where
women are overworked, overbooked and overwhelmed.

National data document the trend. An analysis of federal medical data
requested by The Bee found that an estimated 731,000 young women ages 15 to
24 were diagnosed with the disorder in 2003 and 2004, nearly triple that of
the years 1999 and 2000.

The rate at which men are being diagnosed with ADHD also has gone up but not
as rapidly as that of women.

The increase is not confined to young women. For the first time, women of
all ages are showing up in the statistics.

In 2003 and 2004, an estimated 534,000 women ages 25 to 44, and 337,000
women 45 to 64 were diagnosed with the disorder, according to the National
Center for Health Statistics, a division of the federal Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention. These figures could not be compared with prior years
because there were too few cases during 1999 and 2000 to report, a federal
analyst said.

The increase in diagnoses is a sign that women now recognize their problems
can and should be addressed from a medical perspective, and that physicians
are responding to their calls for help, said Dr. Patricia Quinn, a
developmental pediatrician and director of the National Center for Gender
Issues and AD/HD in Washington, D.C. “Finally, we are reaching parity and
equality,” she said.

Quinn believes that ADHD, and its related malady, attention deficit
disorder, occur at the same rates in boys and girls, men and women. But
because girls typically have different symptoms – inattentiveness but not
hyperactivity – they often can be overlooked.

Problems for girls with ADD can surface in childhood but often don’t become
unmanageable until they leave the structure of home and parental support,
Quinn said.

Amy, a 27-year-old San Francisco artist, was diagnosed with ADD two years
ago.

“As a kid, I was always forgetting my homework,” said Amy, who spoke on the
condition that she be identified only by her first name for fear of
employment discrimination. “I was very disorganized. I would miss
appointments. I couldn’t keep a calendar even if I tried. If I wasn’t
interested in a subject, I’d start spacing out.”

After college, Amy hopped from job to job, frustrated with the “grunt” work
she was asked to do and even more upset that she often made errors doing
menial tasks.

“It would look like I was stupid, but that wasn’t the case,” she said.

Dr. Lawrence Diller, a San Francisco developmental pediatrician and author
of the book, “Running on Ritalin,” said the mothers of his pediatric
patients often seek his advice after recognizing in themselves the same
kinds of attention problems their children have.

Most of the women work outside the home and still take charge of
child-rearing and household maintenance.

“Is she truly disorganized and can’t follow through?” Diller said he asks
himself. “Or is she simply trying to be Superwoman?”

Quinn has seen the same thing in her practice, but because ADHD can run in
families, she assumes the mothers may need medical care, too.

“I always tell moms, ‘To be able to fully help your child, get your own ADD
help first, then we can deal with the issues,’ “ she said. “We add to the
dysfunction unless mom gets treated.”

The underlying cause of attention problems in women – and the self-hatred
and shame that can accompany them – is less significant than relieving the
symptoms, said Kali Grosberg, a 68-year-old Oakland resident who runs a
support group for women with ADHD/ADD.

“A lot of symptoms are partially just a reflection of the world that we live
in right now, being required to work at a pace that the human brain doesn’t
work at comfortably,” Grosberg said. “It’s not important to define it. The
important thing is there are things that can be done about it – support
groups, coaching, exercise or medication.”

As the number of women being diagnosed with ADD has increased in recent
years, so too has the number of prescriptions written for women to treat the
disorder.

A recent analysis by a drug benefit management firm found that among women
ages 20 to 44, use of ADHD medications increased 164 percent between 2000
and 2005.

The analysis by Medco Health Solutions, based on review of prescription
records of 2.5 million patients nationwide, also found that medication use
increased 90 percent among girls 10 to 19.

In both cases, the growth rate far outpaced that of their male counterparts.

Stimulants are the drugs most frequently prescribed for ADHD. They work by
triggering the release of chemicals in the brain that influence attention
and other important functions.

Drugs such as Ritalin, Adderall and Concerta are intended to reduce
distractibility and disorganization and help patients stick to a task and
get it done, said Quinn. “Once you are on the medication, you can maintain a
system,” she said. “It really addresses core symptoms.”

But Wendy Stock, a clinical psychologist in San Francisco with special
training in the study of psychiatric drugs, said she worries that long-term
stimulant use can lead to tolerance, which means dosages would have to
increase over time to remain effective.

“More broadly, why are people, especially women, feeling like they need to
take a medication to get through their day?” Stock asked. “And what
pressures are upon them where they feel they need to function like the
Energizer bunny?”

Different women with ADD describe different experiences with stimulants.

One woman, 45, felt the drugs had a calming effect. “It’s like the
difference between vision and seeing,” she said. “You might have eyes that
can look around, but with medication, you are actually able to see things.
It’s a fog-lifting experience.”

Amy, the 27-year-old artist, said she experimented with several types of
prescription drugs, and her symptoms improved – but at a price.

“It was like I was concentrating to a crazy level,” she said. “I wouldn’t
even get out from behind the desk. I would just sit and work.”

One of her bosses noticed she was following directions better and was more
productive. But Amy disliked the side effects – nausea, anxiety and a loss
of appetite – so she quit taking the drugs.

Today, she is managing her disorder by setting up easy-to-follow routines,
keeping household items in the same places and simplifying her life. To
prevent clutter, for example, she whittled her collection of handbags down
to two, and donates old clothes each time she buys new ones.

Mostly, she said, she better understands her condition and is less hard on
herself when things go awry.

“I accept that I have these issues,” she said. “I don’t get mad at myself.”

About the writer:
The Bee’s Dorsey Griffith can be reached at (916) 321-1089 or
dgriffith@sacbee.com.