Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder: New Challenges for Definition, Diagnosis, and Treatment

Abstract

The extensive literature regarding Attention-Deficit/ Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is often overwhelming, even to those most knowledgeable about this behavioral disorder. Consequently, it requires considerable effort to maintain currency about the numerous clinical and scientific advances reported with ever-greater rapidity and through diverse scientific venues. Our intention with this special issue, AttentionDeficit/Hyperactivity Disorder: Recent Findings, Practical Matters and New Conceptualizations, is to provide a pragmatic and cogent critique of how we define, evaluate, diagnose, and treat individuals with ADHD. Concerted collaborative efforts among disciplines have led to generation and testing of theoretical models, identification of etiology with improved diagnostic acumen, application of more effective and varied treatments, and utilization of newer techniques, including neurophysiological, neuroradiological, and molecular genetic advances. We emphasize these accomplishments as they pertain to ADHD. Additionally, and perhaps most importantly, it is also intended that this issue challenge its readers to recognize the inadequacy of the DSM-IV criteria on which we rely for ADHD diagnosis. Sufficient data now exist to reinforce revision of the older assumptions and models that perpetuate their application. This conclusion is reached in light of considerable scientific advances and a natural progression in the concerted efforts made across disciplines to refine our understanding of ADHD. It is our intention to emphasize these within an integrated framework that cap-