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Company Claims EEG Scans Can Help Identify ADHD
Al writes "Technology Review has an article about a company hoping to expand the clinical use of electroencephalography. Thanks to better sensor technologies, data-processing techniques, and more detailed knowledge of the brain, EEG is expanding into completely new areas. A startup called ElMindA, is developing an EEG system to help doctors diagnose attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Scientists have also used ElMindA's system to characterize brain-activity patterns in patients with ADHD, identifying statistical parameters that differ between normal people and those with ADHD." If "normal people" can sit through high-school classes without being distracted and grumpy, count me out.
Haven't people realized by now that ADHD is nothing more than a symptom of our education system and not a syndrome in and of itself?
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
My own anecdotes.
I do think that it's getting over diagnosed these days, but I was diagnosed with it "back in the day". I thank my parents when I can for not putting me on anything.
Even when I'm running the meetings I will find I will stare directly at the person talking and have no clue what they were talking about because in the last 30 seconds my mind has been on 50 different subjects, mostly about other work I'm doing.
ADHD is akin to having a little buzzer in your head that tells you you have to switch tasks or at least what you're thinking about. Some (good) days the timer is set to a nice 5 minutes. Meaning I can get in a solid 5 minutes of programming. Worst case days it's set at 30 seconds. Meaning every 30 seconds I have to switch what I'm either thinking about or doing. If I'm in the middle of a line of code. I have to check my e-mail. Go to the bathroom. Look around the room. Wonder why the light in that socket is out. Read the posters in my cube. Look at other peoples posters. EVERY 30 SECONDS. Having concurrent 'things' going helps. (Watching movies, etc) because I can listen to the movie and still keep working on what I'm working on.
I agree, it's hard for even 'normal' people to concentrate on boring stuff. The difference is that there are times that there are things I enjoy and should be concentrating on. Worst case scenario is sex. (And this should trigger some +5 Funny's at my expense) But there are some times where my mind is jumping to what is that noise downstairs, did I switch over the laundry, what am I having for dinner, etc. And trust me, it's not fun.
I'm looking at going back to grad school, and I honestly don't think I'd be able to do it. I'm going to talk to my primary care physician and see if I can test out some of the ADHD drugs. If they improve my concentration at work. I just don't want something that takes a while to 'build up'. I more or less want to be able to say "this is a concentration day" pop a pill in the morning and concentrate at work, and on the weekends be able to do my own thing.
(Since starting this post. I've responded to 2 business & 4 personal e-mails. Checked when the best time to plant garlic is (came up this weekend). Updated the mysql pages for a website I run. Opened 3 other php files. Opened the Facebook API page. And launched 2 instances of Matlab. I have 3 rows in my Windows task bar full.)