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ADHD: It could just be a breathing problem
28 June 2007
If you know a child with learning difficulties or who's hyperactive, the
chances are that he or she also suffers from breathing problems at night.

Breathing difficulties and snoring are now being seriously considered as a
cause of ADHD behavioural patterns.
Unfortunately, most parents don't even realize their child has problems
breathing properly at night - and even if they did, they wouldn't have
thought it was anything to do with hyperactivity or learning problems.

But scientists have discovered that sleep-disordered breathing (SDB), as it's
known, may be the unsuspected cause of ADHD-spectrum problems - or it may be
misdiagnosed as ADHD.

Symptoms of ADHD tend to appear early on in a child's life, and the chances
are that there is an associated breathing problem that goes with it.

Scientists have discovered that children whose breathing problems are
tackled early also go on to enjoy greater academic success. In one study of
19 children aged between six and 16, those with breathing problems also had
lower IQ levels than children who were able to breathe properly at night.

In another study, brain scans of children who had breathing problems
revealed neural injury in the area associated with learning and memory.

Often, neither doctors nor parents realize that ADHD may be a wrong
diagnosis, and that the underlying problem relates to breathing problems.
Once these are treated and cleared, the supposed ADHD problems also go away.

Snoring is the most obvious sign of a breathing problem, and it affects
around 1 in 5 children. However, this is for mild cases where the child
snores around three times a week. Severe cases, where the child snores
frequently every night, affects just 1 in 20.

Other signs might include laboured breathing, or snorting and gasping;
others again may adopt unusual sleeping positions, or suffer from nightmares
of drowning or choking.

If your child has SDB and ADHD, the choices offered by medicine are limited.
At one extreme there's surgery to remove the tonsils and adenoids, but this
often doesn't work on its own. Another option is 'continuous positive
airway pressure therapy', which involves an electronic device that delivers
constant air pressure via a nasal mask.

(Source: Journal of the American Medical Association, 2007; 297: 2681-2).