Unspecified Add?

[Shazbot]

Hi,
My 11 year old stepson has recently been diagnosed d with unspecified Add and placed on medication.
It’s taken over 3 years to reach this diagnosis but almost seems like they’ve decided to slap a label on him. Can anyone tells me if this means his symptoms are borderline and if so, should he be on medication? Google results don’t say much about this… Thanks in advance for any help.

• This topic was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by Shazbot.

[Penny Williams]

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-V) outlines 3 types of ADHD officially, and “unspecified” isn’t one of them.

What Are the 3 Types of ADHD?

It sounds like the clinician may have been unsure of the diagnosis — unsure of which type of ADHD to specify, or unsure of ADHD at all. It may be beneficial to seek a specialist for a 2nd opinion.

Penny
ADDitude Community Moderator, Parenting ADHD Trainer & Author, Mom to teen w/ ADHD, LDs, and autism

[Shazbot]

Thank you very much, Penny.
I have suggested this to my partner before as I work in a school so have some understanding of behavioural/ learning disorders and he does have dyslexia which I feel adds to his disinterest and anxiety within the classroom.

[Shazbot]

Actually,
May I ask…? He lives in Finland and his school and psychologist recommend he goes to a school that has severe special needs children but then have a c!ass of 8 students with adhd (which seems a little extreme to me to take someone like my partners son out of mainstream school and place him somewhere like that) I know you can not comment directly on his case, but thefact this is unspecified Add, does this not seem slightly over the top? If they can’t say exactly what he has or maybe if he may not even have anything at all, then surely he should be able to manage in his own school, no? The SEN teacher in my school thought it seemed quite extreme as most schools are equipped to help them.

[Author]

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