4-YEAR FOLLOW-UP OF CHILDREN WITH LOW INTELLIGENCE AND ADHD

Twenty-six of 30 participants (87%) who took part in a medication stud y for treatment of ADHD were followed up 2.9 to 4.8 years (Mean = 3.9 years) later: Parent ratings on the Aberrant Behavior Checklist Commun ity (ABC-C) indicated continued problems on the acting-out subscales, and parent assessments on the Stony Brook Checklist-3R showed a high r ate of difficulty on domains called ADHD, Conduct Disorder; and Separa tion Anxiety Disorder: A high percentage of children (69%) were taking psychotropic drugs, substantial numbers of their families had sought nonmedical treatments, children's friendships were often rudimentary a nd a significant minority of children had disciplinary problems in sch ool or difficulty with the law Using Pearson correlations we identifie d a number of initial variables that predicted follow-up parent rating s on the ABC-C and Stony Brook The ABC-C Irritability subscale was use ful in predicting both internalizing and externalizing problems at fol low-up, whereas parent and teacher hyperactivity subscales failed to p redict later hyperactivity. Children identified with both low intellig ence and ADHD appear to have significant behavioral and emotional prob lems in their early adolescence, and there may be some important quali tative differences in the outcome of these youngsters as compared with that of children identified with ADHD and normal IQ. Copyright (C) 19 96 Elsevier Science Ltd