[tlm09]

in reply to: Graves Disease & ADD in Children #1067352

My daughter, age 9, was just diagnosed 2 weeks ago with Graves. Her medical history has been somewhat complicated over the past 2 years. She was diagnosed almost 2 years ago with ADHD and was started on Adderall XR. Her concentration and hyperactivity seemed to get somewhat better. Then this past summer/fall we noticed that it did not seem to be working as well and her sleep was pretty bad and she was becoming more anxious. We took her in and they decided to do a sleep evaluation and she was diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) due to enlarged tonsils. In December we decided to have her tonsils and adeniod removed at the advice of an ENT specialist. It is our understanding that the OSA can also cause symptoms similar to ADHD. During all of this no blood work was ever done. Then, 2 weeks ago, we were in for a regular medication check with the psychiatrist and they discovered that her heart rate was 122 beats per minute. They had us see her pediatrician to have everything checked out. The day we saw the pediatrician her heart rate was 143 beats per minute. The doctor immediately suspected thyroid since I have a strong family history. She ran blood work and an EKG and determined that she was indeed hyperthyroid. She immediately talked with a pediatric endocrinologist and we took her off her Adderall and began atenolol to bring the heart rate down. We then saw the peds. endocrinologist the following week and she was started on methimazole. I have since been trying to find information on ADHD and Graves disease as I wonder if my daughter truly has ADHD at all. I work in a medical facility and have access to all kinds of journals but have not found anything too clear that suggests that children can be misdiagnosed with ADHD when they truly have hyperthyroidism. I empathize with you in trying to get to the bottom of all of this as I am finding that this could take several months/years of treatment as well as my own research to get to the bottom of my daughter’s struggles. One thing for sure that I have learned is that I have to be my daughter’s own advocate in this!

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