I have a doctors appointment later and would like some suggestions on how to approach the fact I think I am ADD?

I'm going to change my username to 'last minute Lola!!'

Hi Lola,

Did you already go to the doctor's office? If not I would suggest that you bring up exactly why you believe you could have ADD. Most doctor's are fairly approachable, however the minute you say "I have been reading up on the internet....", some of the doc's I know tune out after that. I think they have a bias against the internet in that everyone thinks they know everything there is to know about a subject, thanks to the internet (when that couldn't be farther from the truth).

I would ask how they would go about testing you to confirm or rule out an ADD diagnosis.

Good luck,

At Heart

I have a doctors appointment later and would like some suggestions on how to approach the fact I think I am ADD?


Perhaps a list of reasons why you think you may have ADD. If you have report cards from school that say "would do better if attention paid to detail" ect. . .

Write things down bullet point wise, if you're like me you'll forget bits and get sidetracked. I also told my GP that I had got my partner to assess me against a couple of Adult ADD questionnaires without knowing what they were for, thus there was a second person backing up the possibility.

The GP will know that this comes off the internet/media's no point in being evasive about that....Adult ADD is so little known here that there is no other source of info. The important thing is to show the GP that you have assessed the issue logically and are looking at your issues in a structured manner.

A good GP knows he/she can't have the in depth knowledge and they do rely on patients researching the more obscure issues themselves. This is more likely to occur in practices in an affluent area.

Our healthcare system is different from many others in that the GP acts as gatekeeper to other services and it is not easy to move GP practice. Thus it is important to get your GP on your side by making his/her life easier.


kilt

Ps if this is too late for you.....I hope it went well