Looking for Controlled Studies for Article

Hi there, I am writing because I am in the process of researching for a systematic review in herbal treatments of ADHD which is due to be published in the Canadian Psychopharmacological News, I am an MSc Neuroscience student at the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College, London, UK.

Specifically I am looking for double-blind, placebo, randomised controlled trials (including one or all of these factors) I wondered with your knowledge-base whether you may know of any studies which have been carried out meeting these criteria. I am also curious about your product Attend which I came across while I was researching and I wondered whether you would be able to give me some reference to the evidence your product is based on. I would like to mention it in my article!

Thank you for your help,
LB


Hi LB

This sounds like a great project! I would very much like to read what you come up with when you are done (I'll even publish it on our website if you'd like).

I really don't know of the information that you are seeking. If I come across some leads I will pass them on to you.

Regarding Attend, pretty much everything that I know about it is in this section of our website:
http://newideas.net/adhd/attend and the sub-pages.

Our study was done for the manufacturer itself as a part of their R and D program. We assessed the product that they had on the market at that time, and we worked with them as they changed the formula to be more effective. Our testing was not "double-blind, placebo, randomised controlled trials" as you seek, but rather was simply using baseline parent rating scales and TOVA (cpt) and then follow up at 15 and 30 days rating scales
and Tova.

While this is not what one would do in a university research project, or what a pharmaceutical company would do to try to get a drug approved by the FDA (they would need to do the double-blind, placebo, randomised controlled trials) it is what a clinician would do with a patient to see if medications such as ritalin were working for the subject or not. We had used this procedure successfully with perhaps 300 children and teens with ADHD in the past to see if they were responders to ritalin (or other medications) and what the optimal dosage for that individual might be.

The use of the TOVA eliminates (at least for a clinician) the need for a placebo. One either improves or one does not. There is not placebo effect on a computerized measurement task like the TOVA.

By the way, unless you are a pharmaceutical company, or a government agency that has to approve or deny the use of a drug, the use of "double-blind, placebo, randomised controlled trials" is highly over-rated. It is used as the "standard" for determining if something is of value or if it "works" by the drug companies and physicians who have bought into their system, but in the scope of life is certainly not the only test for it
something is of value.

For example, if the question were "can lifting weights for six months increase muscle size and strength?" the answer "yes" cannot be verified through a process using double-blind, placebo, randomised controlled trials. It can only be verified through a baseline measurement, working the process, and a follow up measurement.

The same is true for questions regarding education, "does attending a university actually increase one's knowledge?" Again answers to questions like these cannot be verified through the double-blind, placebo, randomised controlled trials process.

All things considered, the double-blind, placebo, randomised controlled trials process is very limited, and in most cases in the real world is unnecessary. But in the world of pharmaceutical companies and oversight agencies it is everything to them.

My thoughts. Best of success with your project!

Doug Cowan

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