Autism and ADHD abroad

Anyone here know of any good studies that identifies whether Autism, and ADHD are diseases that are limited to US, or if they are being diagnosed elsewhere?

Any general feelings on this?
-P

of course this is a world wide thing

Originally posted by klain
of course this is a world wide thing

Only difrence is that they put mecury in the vaccines here which make us 1/1000 kinds who have atism..

ADHD comparitive to EU we have 1/1000 also compared to EU which has 1/10,000 cases...
(I personally think this is a cop out for lazy parents who dont wanna take care of thier kids.)

I think they do this to cut down on more of the free speech problem so when they take the internet and make it controlled, not to many people will give a rats ass less...

ala Mind Control.

Originally posted by ThichHeaded


ADHD comparitive to EU we have 1/1000 also compared to EU which has 1/10,000 cases...
(I personally think this is a cop out for lazy parents who dont wanna take care of thier kids.)

While I do believe that ADHD is extremely over-diagnosed here in the U.S., let's not generalize ALL ADHD cases. We have medical tests to determine whether someone has ADD/ADHD. What's sad is that so many doctors and parents end up labeling children and prescribing meds without having any of these medical tests. The doctors are just as much to blame as the parents and teachers.

Originally posted by SourGrapes


While I do believe that ADHD is extremely over-diagnosed here in the U.S., let's not generalize ALL ADHD cases. We have medical tests to determine whether someone has ADD/ADHD. What's sad is that so many doctors and parents end up labeling children and prescribing meds without having any of these medical tests. The doctors are just as much to blame as the parents and teachers.

Amen. The idea that ADHD is simply rooted in the laziness of parents is very common, but the thought that perhaps it is over-diagnosed by doctors is rarely heard. This is not the fault of the medical community, either. There simply isn't enough known about the neurological and psychological basis of ADHD at the moment. Highly reliable diagnostic tests are not available yet. Interestly enough, medication is easily available.

phaedrus

It is diagnosed everywhere.
while i agree that some are diagnosed due to environmental issues, meaning just bad discipline and so on, there is some cases diagnosed due to some medical issues.

My 8 year old daughter has recently been diagnosed with Aspergers Syndrome and has another underlying autism which she is still being tested for. She has ADD which is to say is attention deficiant but not hyperactive.

History.

Years ago i had dental work gone wrong from a public dentist. I had a root canal form absesses which started forming towards my brain. I was rushed to hospital and dosed up on antibiotics via intravenous. Two main ones phlucloxcillin (spelt wrong) and Keflex. The keflex made me feel very ill under my rib cage. I had huge horse sized syringes of the gunk every four hours. When I was released from hospital over a week later I went back to the doctors regarding my periods, which I bled for a few hours then stopped, then started, then stopped. Testing was carried out and i was found to be around 4 weeks pregnant.

The entire pregnancy was high risk, I was told by some doctors that the anti biotics would not affect my child but yet from many laymen I was urged to terminate. I bled every day for the whole nine months.

Kiralea was born after a standard labour with the only unusual thing to happen, was that she was twice born, with a veil over her face, which is too say she was born in her bag. She was out on the table for about ten minutes with the doctors crowding in amazement before they finally slit the bag and removed her, using that instant as her birth time.

She was a healthy baby who gained weight fast, and gained weight and gained weight. She was a reflux baby, vomiting great distances all the time. When she was six months old she was shown to have leg deformities that could and would cripple her, her legs were bent outwards and her feet turned in sideways. I am pidgeon toed myself so I wasn't overly concerned.

She weighed 33 kilo's at 18 months but was bright and intelligent say her first word of hello at 5 months. I took her to doctors left right and centre to be told that it was normal weight and my children are probably going to be like that. No answers were given or labels to her differentness.

As she grew we found issues with her over friendliness, she had no stranger danger at all, even as a baby. She would wander off with other families as if they were her own. She came out with huge words in the right places, making me look and think where the hell did she get that from.

In kindergarden she was well ahead of her peers so it was to much shock and dismay in the next year to be told how far she was behind her peers learning to read and write. She has now been tested many times and found to be well behind them, she cannot write properly or spell or read. Yet her memory tests showed her to be in the 95 percentile, which is to say the top 5 percent for her age in the state. Mathematically she can add up the lunch money items in her head before I can on paper.

Then the behaviour things started standing out. I do not know if they were always there but they started being curious, where she always had people around her, she started being shunned by her peers. She would come home from school and tell me she had spent lunch in the library or by herself. She had temper outbursts in class and started folding and tying ribbons and material. She would drape herself in sheets and twirl things around. She would talk to herself and often complain of the lights moving aorund and the things she could see. She loved to dress in old fashioned and bright things and didn't seem to be concerned at all of looking different. She would physically grab you and pull you around and I found her strength tremendous. I am very strong for my size and she can push me over, beat me at arm wrestles and overall a lot stronger than adults or any female I have met.

She had no ideas of proper, walking out naked in the street, saying embarrassing things to people like mummys got her periods today and other things not considered 'right'. This stunned me, I didn't know what the hell was happening and what I was doing wrong. She would grab bits of material and twirl and fold them all day and at night when I would go into adjust her bed I would find the material all neatly folded up with lots of hair ribbons tying it up neatly and tucked besides her head. She started retreating to her room all the time and getting angry when the other kids would disturb her. Her toys would be lined up and her windowsill crystals would be sorted in colours and types all neatly. She picks sores and points out tiny cuts to me as if they are great disasters. She cannot take pain in any way and screams if the other kids do something to her in play. She comes out with the big words now using them in every day speech but still cannot read words except for words like and, the, but and so on. Her writing and spelling is atrocious and always slopes down the page. She cannot focus on schoolwork yet will spend hours with me when I am showing her maps and globes and pictures of volcanoes and nature. And she remembers everything about our little earth lessons about countries and places and gets indignant if I repeat something to her. She takes it to school and tells them. She constantly touches herself and fidgets and watches the same movies over and over again.

She weighs over 50 kilo's now she stableised for a while when she was 5 but a period of between april last year and december she put on over 17 kilos. I feed all my kids healthy well balanced meals and she doesn't eat junk or lollies. To give you an example I have included a picture of her with her brother and sister. He skin is white, pale compared to my other dark skinned children and she looks nothing like them. I am small, I weigh 46 kilo's and I am 5 foot zero with brownish tanning skin like my other children.

Her bahavious seems to be getting worse or should I say odder. She will not share and likes to have her own things, her own cup and screams if someone else drinks out of it. her own ice cube tray, and other items that are usually shared in a household. She fussed over some bacon I had cooked last week and wouldn't eat it because it had no use by date on the packet, even though I told her I had bought the vac sealed pack the day before.

I have six children of which she is the only one anything like this. My two year old shows potential adhd sympoms and is brilliant at 'buttons' meaning he can put my computer together, all the leads in the right spot then log on. When he first turned two he climbed on the cupboard, got my keys and unlocked the car, took it out of gear and started it up.


By the way I must thanks Grady Phillpot for the links he gave in another thread on Aspergers. They were great learning for me. Kiralea scored 196 severe PDD on one of the tests. Its like a door has been opened up for me now that I know what part of it is. She finally has the support of counsellors after them all scratching their heads up till now and throwing her in the too hard basket. For years I have been yelling there is something wrong with my child please help me understand it and work with it not against it to no avail, even being told by a head paediatrician that I may never know what is wrong with her, oh we know something is wrong but we may not find what.

I wish I could find the keys now of how to teach her to read because the education system is failing in their efforts and their must be a way somehow considering how brilliant she is in other areas. She will not concentrate on any task she doesn't want to do and will go off in pixieland as soon as it is tried to force her to.

So yeah it is all over the world even though sometimes I feel that I am the only one to go through it with their child.





[edit on 11-3-2005 by Mayet]

[edit on 11-3-2005 by Mayet]

Mayet,
Thanks for the very personal story, and wow, what an ordeal! Parenthood scares me, although it most likely won't be for a coupla years. Thank you again!

P

Originally posted by Mayet

So yeah it is all over the world even though sometimes I feel that I am the only one to go through it with their child.

[edit on 11-3-2005 by Mayet]

[edit on 11-3-2005 by Mayet]

Beautiful children, Mayet. They look so much alike!

Thanks for sharing Mayet,

In the end what difference does it make? The only differences are made by us, the only problems are made by us. Your daughter has you and 5 siblings, she will never be truely alone and she will always be understood.

Let her be herself and please don't dope her.

-Smokinjoe

I find it ironic that people are so quick to blame all cases of AD(H)D on lazy parenting, when such conclusions are drawn from lazy thinking and usually always lacking in facts. I have ADD, and was never a naughty kid, grew up with extremely good parents, and have never been on ritalin. For me, it is a condition that has always been about having difficulty maintaining concentration and focus levels, and having a hugely active mind (to the point where it interferes with work and everyday activities), and nothing to do with being unruly or a bad kid.

I would agree that AD(H)D is greatly over diagnosed, but this has more to do with convenience rather than conspiracy. ie: a busy and over-worked doctor/therapist is presented with a badly behaved child; why find out the real reason for their ill-behaviour and invest time in taking corrective measures, when they can just prescribe ritalin and forget about it?

I think that there is a common misconception that AD(H)D is just a buzz-word used for restless or naughty kids, and propagated by pharmoceutical companies to shift ritalin. Pharmo companies might be making the most of it in the USA, but the condition is real, albeit in far less cases than are actually diagnosed. ADHD, is not exclusively characterised by poor behaviour, and often in cases of ADD (such as my own) behaviour is never really a problem. Symptoms vary from case to case depending on home life, IQ, parental IQ, diet, and other factors.

With respect to ADD/ADHD outside of the USA; yep, it does get diagnosed, but in nowhere near the numbers that are diagnosed in the USA. There is a lot of debate going round, particularly within the education establishment as to its nature and validity.

Personally, I feel that wanton and lazy diagnosis of AD(H)D, with prescription of Ritalin etc doesn't do any good at all. As well as a legion of needlesly drugged up kids, it diverts attention and resources away from people who genuinely suffer with the condition. It also adds the obvious counter argument - as heard in any ADHD discussion - that ADD and ADHD are fabricated conditions used to make a fortune for the Pharm co's and to create a mind control mechanism for our youth.

disease

ADD isn't a disease or a disorder, its an advantage for the person having it, if understood by the people around him and if managed correctly by the person with ADD.

Could you elaborate? If you know of any links/research along those lines, I woud be interested to see that as well.

Thanks,
-p

Originally posted by thematrix
ADD isn't a disease or a disorder, its an advantage for the person having it, if understood by the people around him and if managed correctly by the person with ADD.

ADHD incidence rates are 5 to 10 times greater in the United States compared with other countries.

www.beachpsych.com...

[edit on 17-3-2005 by psilocin]

Originally posted by psilocin

ADHD incidence rates are 5 to 10 times greater in the United States compared with other countries.

www.beachpsych.com...

Not only that there has been over 900% increase in Austism in the last decade.

The reason to which this is, is still out there.

Surf