Can Occupational Therapy Help with ADHD?

I chose to listen to the podcast "Can Occupational Therapy Help with ADHD?" by Jennie Friedman with guest speaker Dr. Stephanie Lancaster. I chose this podcast because I have someone in my family that deals with ADHD on a daily bases and I had no clue that you can benefit from occupational therapy if you have ADHD. It is important to learn all you can about a condition to be able to mange it better every day.

While listening to the podcast, I learned a lot of important things about the condition of ADHD. Often times, people can mix up ADHD and sensory processing disorder. There is a fine line in distinguishing between the two disorders. Both disorders can make a person restless and unable to concentrate in task they do in their everyday life. Sensory processing disorder happens when ones brain has trouble receiving and responding to information that goes through your senses. ADHD is more about problems with focusing and controlling impulsive behaviors. Both of these disorders can cause people to be anxious and even act out in social setting. Some children with ADHD might get mislabeled as problem children when they don't follow the "sit still and focus" rules in classroom settings. They are not "bad" children, they are just having trouble focusing on one thing. These type of children can fall under the category of sensory seekers. Examples of things that sensory seekers do is twisting or playing with their hair, spinning in circles when sitting on the rug during quiet time, tapping their pencil, chewing on their pencil, and even picking or chewing their nails. There is a sensory profile that OT's in the school settings do to test to see if children have ADHD. The profile is called the Dunn Sensory Profile. The OT will give the teacher and the parents a form to fill out for that child. It helps the OT see what behaviors the child has at school and at home.

When dealing with a child that is a "sensory seeker", there needs to be something put into place to help the child focus their attention in the right place. An example that Dr. Lancaster gave during the podcast was called the Sensory Diet. It is not your typical diet. It has nothing to do with food. She even said another name for it could be the sensory schedule. For the sensory diet, the OT would tell the teacher to have the child take a "move break" for about three minutes every hour and a half to two hours. The teacher can have the whole class participate. It can be something as simple as having the class do jumping jacks in place or doing a stretching exercise for three minutes. This gives the child a break from focusing and allows them to relax their mind. It helps with anxiety they may feel because of their ADHD condition. Doing this everyday can make the child happier and have them actually enjoy school instead of dreading it every day.

Overall, I really enjoyed this podcast. It was helpful to see that there are more ways to help with ADHD than taking medication. I learned from listening to Dr. Lancaster and Jennie Friedman, that minor changes to a person's environment and routine can help people with ADHD fix or manage their problems if they can commit to doing it every day.  ADHD is a daily battle for people and it is important that they know there are was to manage it besides medication. I strongly believe that occupational therapy can help find ways to manage the disorder that fits each individual specifically.