ADHD Medication

[ADHDmumma]

DS took MedikinetXL a few years ago, whilst it did improve his concentration and attention,
it caused him to be anxious and so we stopped medicating. He is now at secondary school and we are thinking about medication again.

Has anyone had success with a different type of stimulant (Elvanse for example), that has a different active ingredient if they’ve reacted badly to methylphenidate based medication?

I don’t really want him taking one that he needs to have daily and that needs weaning off etc.

I am on Elvanse. No anxiety so far. I also tried Mediknet and got anxious on after about a month.

If you struggle to get medication again, you can go right to choose jsut for titration.

The key to the stimulants I think is the right dose, keeping it as low as possible to minimise anxiety. You do however have to take them daily. He could come off them over the school holidays if he wanted to but this should all be handled by the doctor who is overseeing his treatment.
Elvanse has worked for both my DC but they also tried Concerta and Mediknet before settling on Elvanse.

It's common for people to get a better response to the other medicine if they didn't get on with the first one. There are two main stimulants which are used, all the various brands are just variations on the same thing.

It's also possible that now he is older he would experience the first one differently.

You will get a lot of replies suggesting X medication is better than Y but it's just very individual. The response rate is roughly the same, it's a bit like the contraceptive pill, the one that works well without side effects for your best mate is not necessarily the one which will work well for you.

You can use this acrostic to help when you speak to the prescribing doctor about options:

BRAIN

Benefits - what are they? Why is this specific option being recommended over others?
Risks - what are they? How often does that occur? What can we do if it does?
Alternatives - are there any, and how do they stack up against the others?
Immediate - do we need to act now, how long can we wait to decide?
Nothing - what happens if we do nothing? (IME, this is often the most valuable question).

I thinks she means unlike non-stimulant medication for ADHD which usually takes a month or so to build up and so needs to be taken every day to have a consistent effect. With the stimulants you need to take them every day you want to be medicated. With the non-stimulants if you have a break you are
starting again at building the effect up.

DD17 is on Medikinet 60mg and gets really anxious, but was also anxious before she started taking it!

@SheRasBrayou absolutely do not need to take stimulant meds every day and you don’t need your doctor to handle whether you stop over the school holidays. But when and how you take it and when you might want to not take it should be covered during your titration.
I have an older child who is on short acting methylphenidate (Medikinet) and they just take them when they need them - it may be once, twice or three times a day, or not at all. My younger child is on Elvanse, after starting on Concerta, and found Elvanse was better. They also have breaks at weekends or holidays if not needed. And I’m on Elvanse but take it pretty much every day because as a mum I don’t get holidays…
Only side effects any of us have really are a dry mouth and loss of appetite, which improves if you take consistently. If you do have a break of more than a day or two then it tends to make the side effects more noticeable again for a bit. Personally I don’t see a downside of taking every day but my children are old enough to decide for themselves.
@ADHDmummaif you think your child would benefit from medication, and high school is definitely a step up and where my children’s problems became apparent, triggering the assessment process, then absolutely do it. You at least are going into it with some knowledge of what didn’t work before. Good luck.

Yes that’s what I mean.

Sorry, I meant the dose should be managed by the overseeing consultant. We always started really low on a new drug and tried increasing the dose to find the balance between efficacy and side effects.

Both my DC find it too much to come off their meds totally in the holidays but I have suggested they could ask for a low dose just for those periods if they wanted.

Dd started on concerta and her emotions went completely out of control on any dose that worked

elvanse has been much better. It does impact her sleep and her appetite but someone else I know who takes it doesn’t have those side effects

definitely worth trying again and see what works