ADHD | Mental Health
ADHD Medication Trials
What to expect when a doctor prescribes ADHD medication
Obligatory Disclaimer
This is not an article about different medications and their pros and cons, nor is it a debate about whether or not to use medications to treat ADHD.
As with any medical advice, those are conversations to be had with a medical professional.
What this article is about is what you might expect if you or your child are prescribed and start taking a medication to treat ADHD. This is not predicting what will happen, this is outlining some of the possibilities of what might happen.
These possibilities are based on research, personal experience, as well as my professional experience supporting families who — in consultation with their doctors — have chosen to try ADHD medications.
There are two different types of medications that can be used to treat ADHD symptoms: stimulant and non-stimulant. Stimulants are the most commonly prescribed as they tend to help with focus, hyperactivity, impulsivity, and emotional regulation.
Non-stimulant medications tend to be the back-up plan for people who don’t tolerate the stimulants or their side-effects well, but this is not always the…
