6 Questions for Recognizing ADHD in Adults

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

This proposed version of the World Health Organization ADHD Self-Report Screening Scale is a short questionnaire designed to help people easily assess the possibility that they might have ADHD. (Researchers have revised the scale to fit the new criteria for evaluating ADHD introduced by the DSM-5 and to reflect how ADHD  presents differently in adults than in children.)

It’s important to keep in mind that this new questionnaire isn’t an absolute measure of whether someone has ADHD. But it can be a useful tool for assessing whether a further look is in order.

The official screener hasn’t been published yet. At this time,  “scores” would be best guesses based on the following information.

The choice of answers range from never, to rarely, sometimes, often and very often. Never is always zero, but the higher frequency answers are assigned varying points.

  1. How often do you have difficulty concentrating on what people are saying to you, even when they are speaking to you directly?
  2. How often do you leave your seat in meetings or other situations in which you are expected to remain seated?
  3. How often do you have difficulty unwinding or relaxing when you have time to yourself?
  4. When you’re in a conversation, how often do you find yourself finishing the sentences of the people you are talking to before they can finish them themselves?
  5. How often do you put things off until the last minute?
  6. How often do you depend on others to keep your life in order and attend to details?

Points are given to each question according to the relative importance of the question is to diagnostic criteria. The highest score if Questions 1,2, and 3 are answered very often is 5 points. The 4th question’s top score is 2. The 5th’s highest is 4, while the final question is 3. That makes 24 points in total, with 14 points being the point at which additional evaluation is recommended.

We’ve created a Free Printable of what we think the scale will look like based on the previous information.

 

The development of the new ADHD Screener from a 2017 APSARD conference promotional video – 13-minutes

Sources:

6 Questions for Recognizing ADHD by Neil Patterson – https://blogs.psychcentral.com/adhd-millennial/2017/04/6-questions-for-recognizing-adhd/ (Link works)

The World Health Organization Adult Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Self-Report Screening Scale for DSM-5 

Authors: Berk Ustun, MS1; Lenard A. Adler, MD2,3; Cynthia Rudin, PhD4,5; et al

http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2616166

Brief Screening Tool for Adult ADHD Released

Copy and Paste: http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/878810?src=wnl_edit_tpal&uac=150032AY#vp_2