A STUDY OF PREVALENCE AND PATTERN OF ATTENTION DEFICIT DISORDER WITH HYPERACTIVITY IN PRIMARY SCHOOL CHILDREN1

The present study was undertaken with the aim of 1) Identifying students with ADDH in a primary school children and 2) to study the phenomenology of ADDH. One English medium school of suburb of Bombay agreed to participate in the study. The clats teachers of primary divisions (Std. I to IV) filled the specially designed proforma for each student. Those students scoring 11 or more points were studied in detail. The parents were asked to fill other special proforma including 10 item Parent Teacher rating scale for ADDH. At least one of the parent and the index child were interviewed separately. Prevalence of ADDH in 321 primary school children between the age of 5-10 years was found to be 8.1 %. The ratio of boys to girls was 7.6:1. ADDH was significantly associated with age group 8 to 10 years in boys and in total sample. First born children were significantly more in ADDH group. All the students had average or above average I. Q. still 8.33 percent students had failed in annual examinations. The complicated deliveries were more common. 87.5% of parents had not considered ADDH as abnormal.