Professor Philip Shaw discusses some medications use to treat ADHD, which lead to improvements in up to 90% of children.

In the treatment of ADHD, there are two main families of drugs. There is the methylphenidate-like drugs, that is the Ritalin family of drugs, and they probably work by flooding the brain with a bit of dopamine. There are also amphetamine-like drugs; Adderall is the most common one, and they probably have a pretty much similar form of action. We know that those two classes of drugs are extremely effective in childhood ADHD. Up to 90 percent of children will show a good, sustained clinical response to these medications. That actually holds true for very young kids, as well. So, there are extremely effective medications in the treatment of ADHD. There are newer drugs, which are also effective, probably a bit less so. Atomoxetine or Strattera, which is a drug that looks a little bit chemically like an anti-depressant drug, seems to be effective as well. The thought is that somehow that affects how the brain takes up noradrenaline and serotonin, which in turn seems to be very effective in treating the symptoms of ADHD. There are lots of other medications that can be used and are particularly effective whenever ADHD is complicated with other disorders, but they are very much second and third line drugs. So the mainstay of pharmacological treatment of ADHD remains very much the stimulants, and the two main families are methylphenidate-like drugs and amphetamine-like drugs.

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