Archive for mental health
Common questions about ADHD treatments
If your child is diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), you may have questions about which treatments will work best. When considering an intervention for your child, we recommend that you ask your clinician if there are any research studies that back it up. Evidence-based interventions are treatments that have been studied using standardized ... Read More
New treatment guidelines for complex ADHD
Approximately 7.5 percent of children and adolescents in the U.S. have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and about two-thirds of them have one or more co-existing conditions such as learning disorders or mental health problems. Treatment for these more complex forms of ADHD has focused largely on medical interventions. But now, a new clinical guideline ... Read More
First-of-its-kind study links puberty blockers to lower odds of suicidal thoughts
Also called puberty blockers, gonadotropin-releasing hormone analogues (GnRHas) are medications that can halt estrogen and testosterone production, effectively suppressing the physical changes associated with puberty. This allows transgender and non-binary teens to explore their gender identity without the pressure of puberty, which can exacerbate feelings of dysphoria. GnRHas are administered by implants or injections and ... Read More
Ava’s mental health journey
Ava remembers filling a small pink notebook with all her worries in just one month when she was 5 years old. Ava’s anxiety would not let her fully experience life, because she was constantly in fear of the world around her. She says, “I was being controlled by my fear rather than my own decisions.” Celebrating ... Read More
Give yourself a break with meditation
Do you start the day with anxiety and end it by thinking about how the day’s good intentions went awry? You can rework this cycle through meditation. While meditation can’t hold back all the curve balls thrown into your life, it does offer a way to cope and adjust your perspective. We recently discussed how ... Read More
Empowering pediatricians to provide mental health care
By late adolescence, up to 20 percent of children will have experienced impairing levels of anxiety, depression, and/or ADHD, the most common and treatable mental health conditions. But child behavioral health specialists are in chronic short supply with long wait lists. Massachusetts, for example, has nearly 300,000 youths with at least one diagnosable psychiatric disorder ... Read More
Talking with your child about suicide
For three weeks in late spring of 2018, it seemed like suicide dominated the media. On May 18, the second season of the controversial series 13 Reasons Why began airing on Netflix. Eighteen days later, fashion designer Kate Spade died by suicide, followed three days later by celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain. Such news came on the heels ... Read More