Does Pharmacological Treatment of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in Adults Enhance Parenting Performance?

ADHD Clinical Trial

Official title: Does Pharmacological Treatment of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in Adults Enhance Parenting Performance?

Status Completed

Clinical Trial Summary

It is now well recognized that Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a chronic disorder of childhood that extends into adulthood for many individuals. A number of impairments in daily life functioning have been identified in adults with ADHD, including marital distress, risky driving, and using less effective parenting practices (e.g., Barkley, 2006).

Specifically, some parents with ADHD have been found to use inconsistent discipline, less parental involvement, and less positive reinforcement with their children compared to parents without ADHD (e.g., Chen & Johnston, 2007; Chronis-Tuscano, Clarke, Rooney, Diaz, & Pian, 2008). While there is some evidence that stimulant medication improves parental functioning for adults with ADHD, only one study has specifically explored the use of stimulant medication and parenting(Chronis-Tuscano, Seymour, Stine, Jones, Jiles, Rooney, et al., 2008).

The purpose of this study is to explore whether or not the stimulant medication, lisdexamfetamine, improves parent functioning. Measures of parenting behavior, parental psychosocial functioning, and child psychosocial functioning will be collected. It is hypothesized that lisdexamfetamine will be associated with some improvement in these assessments.

Clinical Trial Description

Seventy families with at least one parent (either mother or father who will serve as the identified subject) and a school-aged child (ages 5-16) with ADHD will be recruited to participate in a randomized, placebo-controlled trial of lisdexamfetamine to assess the acute and prolonged effects of medication usage on parent-child interactions. The protocol will employ traditional self-report measures of parental competency and functioning used in other studies, but will supplement them with one of the most widely used observational laboratory tasks.

Families will be recruited on a rolling basis and the length of the study will be approximately 8 weeks. In the first three weeks of the study, parents will complete the dose optimization phase to find the optimal dose of lisdexamfetamine. Lisdexamfetamine will be initiated at a dose of 30mg and increased to 50mg for week 2 and 70mg for week 3. During week 4, measures of the acute effects of lisdexamfetamine will be collected, and parents will complete the observational laboratory parent child interaction tasks two times (i.e., on lisdexamfetamine and on placebo- phase I). In the remaining four weeks of the study (phase 2) a between subjects comparison will be conducted. Half of the parents will be randomized to receive lisdexamfetamine and half will receive a placebo. Measures of parent functioning will once again be collected at the end of phase 2 and parents will complete the observational laboratory task, which will allow for exploration of prolonged lisdexamfetamine treatment on parent-child interactions. ;

Study Design

Allocation: Randomized, Endpoint Classification: Efficacy Study, Intervention Model: Parallel Assignment, Masking: Double Blind (Subject, Outcomes Assessor), Primary Purpose: Treatment

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• ADHD
• Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity

• NCT number: NCT01127607
• Study type: Interventional
• Source: Florida International University
• Status: Completed
• Phase: Phase 4
• Start date: November 2010
• Completion date: July 2012