ADHD Does Not Exist
In this groundbreaking and controversial book, behavioral neurologist Dr. Richard Saul draws on five decades of experience treating thousands of patients labeled with Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder—one of the fastest growing and widely diagnosed conditions today—to argue that ADHD is actually a cluster of symptoms stemming from over 20 other conditions and disorders. According to recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an estimated 6.4 million children between the ages of four and seventeen have been diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. While many skeptics believe that ADHD is a fabrication of drug companies and the medical establishment, the symptoms of attention-deficit and hyperactivity are all too real for millions of individuals who often cannot function without treatment. If ADHD does not exist, then what is causing these debilitating symptoms? Over the course of half a century, physician Richard Saul has worked with thousands of patients demonstrating symptoms of ADHD. Based on his experience, he offers a shocking conclusion: ADHD is not a condition on its own, but rather a symptom complex caused by over twenty separate conditions—from poor eyesight and giftedness to bipolar disorder and depression—each requiring its own specific treatment. Drawing on in-depth scientific research and real-life stories from his numerous patients, ADHD Does not Exist synthesizes Dr.
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What Hacker News says
- I highly recommend reading about the opinion of this doctor that ADD doesn't exist as a separate condition. It is, instead, a symptom of many other possible conditions.
http://time.com/25370/doctor-adhd-does-not-exist/
This is consistent with my own experience with people who believe they have ADD. Many of them turned out to have untreated anxiety and depression.
It's also interesting to note that there's a lot of research supporting the idea that mindfulness can decrease the effects of ADD. That seems to support the idea that ADD isn't a physiological fact, but a curable behavioral issue.
- I can imagine a great many things we collapse to one term because of similarities are in fact distinct, from myriad causes. Cancer is an example. The common cold is diagnosed based on symptoms, but is a reaction to any of several kinds of virus. Hell, a crab or a tree is not one class of things, but many that converged on common solutions.
There’s an ADHD specialist, a neurologist, who wrote a book called “ADHD Does Not Exist”. His core argument is that ADHD is not a single disorder but a collection of symptoms that cluster together from many different underlying causes. https://isbn.nu/9780062266743
- I know I will get downvoted. But Tom Cruise is right. Psychiatry is largely nonsense and the DSM book is almost arbitrarily made up by a bunch of suits. In most of the higher quality studies, antidepressants are no better than placebo. And “ADHD Does Not Exist”, that’s book title by one of the foremost ADHD psychiatrists who helped popularize it but is now calling for a reversion. The symptoms exist, not ADHD is not a real disease.
- It was referenced in the book "ADHD does not exist" from Richard Saul M.D, I'll look for the book to find some links
- I've always been absolutely opposed to banning books.
...then I got diagnosed with adult ADHD, which, boy howdy, explains a lot about my life, and I'm only somewhat resentful of my parents for pursuing an alternative medicine approach when I was diagnosed as a kid. But anyway, that's just setting the scene.
Then I went to my local library to get some books on adult ADHD, to help my wife understand it better, and they only had one book on adult ADHD (quite a few more on child ADHD, natch), but in the same section, had two books stating unequivocally that ADHD was a made-up condition.
These ones:
Debunking ADHD: 10 Reasons to Stop Drugging Kids for Acting Like Kids - https://www.amazon.com/dp/1475827377/
ADHD Does Not Exist: The Truth About Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder - https://www.amazon.com/ADHD-Does-Not-Exist-Hyperactivity/dp/...
And I guess, now that I had a strong personal stake, I felt rather offended by these books.
I don't want to ban them, but I'd very much prefer that the library filed them under "alternative medicine" rather than under "mental illness > ADHD". Not so much for myself, but for any kids who get diagnosed and have a parent or parents similar to mine looking for a reason to deny the diagnosis.
- In the book "ADHD Does not Exist" Richard Saul describes Neurochemical Diststractibility/Impulsivity(what we call adhd) of two types : low serotoning group and high level epinephrine/norepinephrine group. "The two types described show subtly different symptom patterns.The low-serotonin group tends to look like what people think of when they think of the disorder called ADHD. The high epinephrine/norepinephrine group is "consistent in its inconsistency". Sometimes these patiens can concentrate well, and sometimes they can't." Maybe this is related to what you say, I see it myself, somedays my brain just works better, I never understood why.
