Screening for ADHD in Adult Patients With Epilepsy: Prevalence of Symptoms and Challenges to Diagnosis.

OBJECTIVE

Given the complex nature of seizure disorders and their treatments, ADHD may be underdiagnosed in this population. We hypothesized that a higher percentage of patients presenting to a seizure clinic would endorse ADHD symptoms compared to rates reported in the general population and that formal screening for ADHD symptoms would identify patients with previously undiagnosed comorbid ADHD.

METHODS

In this study, we surveyed 312 adults in a seizure clinic using the Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS-v1.1).

RESULTS

We found that 90 patients (28.8%) screened positive with the ASRS-v1.1, but only nine of these patients were able to complete neuropsychological testing,. Out of these patients, only one was diagnosed with possible ADHD.

CONCLUSION

Through this process, we identified many challenges to making a new ADHD diagnosis in this population, including attention deficits due to other medical or psychiatric diagnoses, a positive urine drug screen, lack of collateral report/information about developmental history, and barriers to neuropsychological evaluation.