As a GP, more and more people are coming to see me about ADHD. But with specialists overwhelmed, where should they turn?
‘It’s no wonder people started looking inwards when they didn’t immediately “bounce back” with the end of lockdowns’ says Dr Nicholas Hudson.‘It’s no wonder people started looking inwards when they didn’t immediately “bounce back” with the end of lockdowns’ says Dr Nicholas Hudson.t seems like almost everyone has a friend who has recently been diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder .
There can also be a snowball effect of symptom recognition. With swathes of algorithmic social media where people relate their experiences, or by talking to friends and hearing their stories,signs such as reading sentences off a page without absorbing any of it, forgetting a pin number that’s been used for a decade or feeling overwhelmed by the noise, sights and smells returning to the grocery store, school or office.
Don’t get me wrong: most of the people who come in wanting to explore an ADHD diagnosis meet the criteria and then some. But where does that leave them? And where does it leave a mental health system where wait times to see a psychiatrist were already teetering on untenable, before living through a global pandemic made us all feel that bit more vulnerable?
Legislative requirements vary between state and territories, but from a Victorian context, medication requires a diagnosis by a psychiatrist , and either initiation of medication by the psychiatrist or deputisation of a GP through a written plan, that the GP can then use as supporting evidence to apply for a permit to prescribe. These permits can be held for up to two years.
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