Has anyone out there had any personal experience with Neurofeedback for AD/HD? Would really like to hear about experiences and outcomes! Thanks.
clonidine
Have you ever tried clonidine/catapress? Its a blood pressure medication that has a calming side effect to kids with ADHD. I had a student last year that was just off the wall even on Adderall. His doctore put him on a low dose of clonidine and his world changed. He became more motivated and concerned with his grades. His impulses were more in check.
I tried my son on a very low dose this year and it didn’t work for him…he was falling asleep in class.
Has anyone had any success in this?
Re: clonidine
I had my son on it when he was 2 for a short time. He has sleep problems at the time and never slept all night till he was 3. The clonidine knocked him out of the world for 2 hours tops and he was back up. Since he was diagnosed at age 8 with ADHD he has not been on any meds.
Re: clonidine
Ironically my son was on clonidine to control his blood pressure (he has had a kidney transplant, and when your kidneys don’t work perfectly, you often have high blood pressure. When we switched to another bp medication and weaned him from clonidine, his behavior deteriorated rapidly. We were completely stumped as to what was goingon. A psychiatrist that we occasionally consulted figured out that it was the clonidine withdrawal! Clonidine had been masking his ADHD behaviors for who knows how long.
Clonidine absolutely controls impulsive inappropriate behavior! The down side is that is causes much sleepiness! A few times we have accidentally given my son an extra dose, and he would sleep ALL day! I’m not exaggerating. Most children can only tolerate taking it before bed.
One potential danger is that some children diagnosed with ADHD really have an undiagnosed sleep disorder in the first place. Clonidine will just make that worse without fixing the real problem. At the same time I have to agree that clonidine will prevent alot of socially unacceptable behaviors!
Although my child still takes some clonidine, I remain hopeful that we will successfully get him off it someday soon.
Well, I have some experience but my son doesn’t have classic ADHD. He has other medical, neurological issues and anxiety from chronic medical trauma. But his brain waves don’t present in the classic profile that some kids with ADHD do. I think neurofeedback can help alot of children with ADHD if you have a qualified professional supervising it who also has a good rapport with children.
I think that children need to be screened for other issues as well especially essential fatty acid deficiency, and if they snore, sleep apnea. These problems can cause ADHD “behaviors.”
Good luck pursuing neurofeedback!
Linda