[IEP_guide] Tonsil removal may cure ADHD behavior in kids

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Tonsil removal may cure ADHD behavior in kids

10:59 PM CDT on Saturday, August 11, 2007

From Wire Reports

TUCSON, Ariz. — Little T.J. was a monster. There's no other way to

say it.

Extremely hyperactive, the toddler ran around in circles, destroying

everything in his path. He got kicked out of day care and banned from

friends' homes.

His own grandmother called the 2-year-old a " monster. " Friends told

his family that T.J. — short for Terence — was destined to

be " the next serial killer. "

" He was so out of control, I was at my wits' end, " said his mother,

Norton. " It is hurtful to realize nobody likes your child. "

That was then. Today, as T.J. gets ready to turn 3, he is a changed

boy. Lively, to be sure, but affectionate instead of mean.

" It's a total turnaround — this is a different child, " Ms. Norton

said. " Everybody notices the difference. "

A frontal lobotomy? Electroshock therapy? Powerful drugs?

No, T.J. had his tonsils out.

The removal of a child's tonsils can, in some cases, significantly

improve, even cure, severe hyperactivity often diagnosed as attention

deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Now affecting more than 2 million U.S. children, ADHD most often is

treated with psychoactive drugs, sometimes for a lifetime.

But in some children, simply removing the tonsils also has removed

the diagnosis, by restoring normal behavior.

" Sometimes you get really great results, sometimes you see partial

results in these children, " said Dr. Damian Parkinson, the

psychiatrist who suggested T.J.'s behavior might be related to his

tonsils.

The key to making that connection is how the child sleeps. Snoring,

restlessness, apnea, and gasping for breath during the night are

clearly linked to hyperactive daytime behavior in very young

children. And enlarged or infected tonsils and adenoids — immune-

related tissue masses in the throat — most often are the cause

of " sleep-disordered breathing. "

In one recent study, at the University of Michigan, 22 children with

ADHD and sleep-disordered breathing had adenotonsillectomies. After

one year, 11 no longer battled ADHD.

" These improvements are remarkable because hyperactivity and

inattention generally are expected to be chronic features in affected

school-age children, " the researchers wrote in a report published

last year in Pediatrics.

As a result of this and other recent studies, " doctors conducting

healthy-child checkups should always ask about snoring, poor sleep,

behavioral and learning problems, and look for physical signs such as

enlarged tonsils and adenoids, " reads a summary published in the

Journal of the American Medical Association in June.

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