Prevalence of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder symptoms in 4-to 17-year-old children in the general population

The purposes of this study were (a) to estimate the prevalence of Attention -Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (AD/HD) symptoms in the general preschool a nd school population; and (b) to analyze the influence of gender, age, and socioeconomic status (SES) variables on ADI HD symptoms. Out of the 80,000 preschool and schoolchildren living in Manizales, Colombia, a random sample of 540 children was selected. Two gender, three age (4- to 5-year olds, 6- to 11-year olds, and 12-to 17-year olds), and three SES (low, middle, and high) groups were used. The 18 DSM-IV symptoms corresponding to AD/HD Crite rion A were assessed on a scale of 0(never) to 3 (almost always). All three demographic variables established statistically significant differences: A D/HD symptoms were more frequent in 6-to Ii-year-old, low-SES, male partici pants. DSM-IV Criterion A for AD/HD was fulfilled by 19.8% of the boys and 12.3% of the girls. However, this difference was marginally significant onl y in the AD/HD Subtype I: Combined. It was concluded that demographic varia bles are significant correlates of the AD/HD diagnosis. The prevalence foun d in this study was higher than usually reported, even though only the symp tomatic DSM-IV AD/HD criterion was analyzed. We failed to confirm the assum ed AD/HD gender ratio.