Tablets taken for controversial disorder queried by psychologist

A LEADING psychologist has questioned why thousands of Irish children are taking tablets every day to stave off the symptoms of a controversial disorder that has been discredited by the man who created it.

Clinical psychologist Dr Tony Humphreys said that most children given an attention deficit disorder (ADD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), or ODD diagnosis in this country, are on medication like Ritalin or Concerta. He believes, however, that they are unnecessarily taking dangerous pills every day when the solution lies in tackling emotional issues at home and at school.

Writing in this newspaper, Dr Humphreys says the psychologist who first named the syndrome in the ’70s, Dr Robert Spitzer, made a U-turn earlier this year admitting that he should have looked at the “context of the labelled children’s lives” when first devising the term.