Adult-onset ADHD is rare.

Being diagnosed as an adult is not.

Symptoms become more obvious since affected individuals can’t compensate for them indefinitely.

Challenges of adulthood often overwhelm coping strategies that helped navigate childhood and adolescence.

Here are 8 things for adults to consider when being assessed for ADHD:

1. Functional Impairment - To be diagnostic, signs and symptoms interfere with performance in 2 domains, most often work and home.
2. Preferring vs. Avoiding Tasks - Novel and stimulating tasks are strongly preferred over repetitive and boring tasks by adults with ADHD. It’s also often hard to start new tasks.
3. Driving Difficulty - Untreated ADHD can increase risk for motor vehicle accidents and driving citations. This history is important to share with the clinician.
4. Emotional Dysregulation - Not a core ADHD symptom, but it is caused by problems with executive functioning and low frustration tolerance. Clinician needs to ensure it’s not caused by a different diagnosis.
5. Friends, Family and Colleagues - People close to the affected individuals are often best positioned to provide information to corroborate functional impairment in 2 settings.
6. Comprehensive Assessment- A brief, one-time appointment won’t do it. Clinicians should conduct a thorough diagnostic interview, complete validated rating scales, and collect psychosocial information.
7. Treatment Considerations - Other mental health diagnoses should be treated first to see if symptoms improve. Tolerance to stimulants can develop over time and there are strategies in place to help.
8. History of Addiction - Past stimulant use disorder means other medications will be prescribed instead. Other substance use disorders don’t rule out the use of stimulant medications.

More often than not, ADHD is missed in adolescents and young women. That means the wrong treatment and the development of other mental health symptoms.