Tonsils and ADHD? | ADHD Information

There is a thread on  this somewhere.anyway, DD had her tonsils out, and it did nothing for her ADHD. If it "cures " the ADHD, then it wasn't ever ADHD to begin with...there is no cure for ADHD.

 

here is what i found on the internet, I also read that Iron helps symptoms as well.

I have a ped. appointment next month to discuss my sons allergies and cronic colds...she had suggest removing his tonsils I will have to ask if this would help with the ADHD

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The premise is that the tonsils and/or adnoids are interfering with breathing during sleep, which causes the child to become sleep deprived and results in adhd- like symptoms.  It's only a very small percentage of children who actually have this problem.

My son had his tonsils and adnoids out last fall with no change in his adhd symptoms.  However he no longer gets strep every 6- 8 weeks, which was why they were taken out, so we're happy.

I totally agree with jaderock54. That's the reason my son's tonsils were removed. It didn't help his sleep b/c he is adhd and the meds keep him up. Maybe it owuld have helped the sleep if he wasn't adhd. What I do know for sure is that it didn't help his behavior one bit. His tonsils were the size of limes so they needed to come out anyways.

Just my 2 cents worth!Has anyone read or heard about this?  My mom calls to tell me that "they say" getting my DS tonsils out will cure him.  Also had a friend bring it up, what does tonsils have to do with dopamine????  What is this all about?  Anybody?
S

There was a study stating that the reason why children were hyperactive/aggressive was because their adenoids were interferring with their sleeping patterns....it was stated by removing these adenoids, it will "cure" the ad/hd symptoms....which doctors, psychiatrict and neuro is not finding a basis for.   Usually they remove adenoids because of sleep apnea or you just can't breathe...likewise tonsils.

However, doctors, psychiatrict and neuro, did find that children with AD/HD had a higher percentage of having large adenoids...which my child does have...but other than the regular it has no correlation with AD/HD.

 

My child had Strep 2x...boy was that miserable...had to get that penicllin shot in his behind.

 

 

Inner_Beauty39313.6874884259When I first took my son to a neuro, he immediately ordered a sleep study when he saw my son's tonsils. The study showed only a minor sleep disorder, but we saw an ENT anyway, at the request of the neuro. The ENT was from a different hospital and did not recommend doing a T&A for such a minor sleep disturbance. When the neuro heard that, he wanted us to come to his hospital to see an ENT, but I declined. I felt very confident with the doctor we saw at a very reputable children's hospital. For some reason, my neuro felt sure that taking out the tonsils and adnoids would make things "better", but I didn't buy it. I know there are studies that show a correlation between sleep disorders and ADHD symptoms, but we chose the medication route instead...only been on it a week and are not seeing a difference, so we probably need to adjust.

jaderock54 is right on with the deprivation of sleep theory.

Technically, some of the kids who were "cured" of ADHD by tonsil removal, did not have ADHD to begin with.  They were just sleep deprived.

There was a recent study which intentionally deprived non-ADHD kids of sleep over an extended period of time--it was reported last spring on CNN.  Guess what?  While sleep deprived, they all exhibited symptoms of ADHD.

Now look at the stats for college kids (probably sleep deprived) illegally using ADHD meds for taking exams.