Moderators and Other Predictors of Methylphenidate Response in Children and Adolescents with ADHD

Barbara D’Aiello, Silvia Di Vara, Pietro De Rossi, Italo Pretelli, Stefano Vicari and Deny Menghini
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Barbara D’Aiello: Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Unit, Department of Neuroscience, Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital, IRCCS, 00146 Rome, Italy
Silvia Di Vara: Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Unit, Department of Neuroscience, Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital, IRCCS, 00146 Rome, Italy
Pietro De Rossi: Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Unit, Department of Neuroscience, Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital, IRCCS, 00146 Rome, Italy
Italo Pretelli: Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Unit, Department of Neuroscience, Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital, IRCCS, 00146 Rome, Italy
Stefano Vicari: Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Unit, Department of Neuroscience, Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital, IRCCS, 00146 Rome, Italy
Deny Menghini: Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Unit, Department of Neuroscience, Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital, IRCCS, 00146 Rome, Italy

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 3, 1-10

Abstract: Methylphenidate (MPH) is the treatment of first choice for developmental ADHD. To date, no reliable method to predict how patients will respond to MPH exists and conflicting results are reported on clinical characteristics of responders. The present study aims to give a more precise characterization of the patients who will respond best to MPH to help clinicians in defining the treatment plan. Age, neuropsychological functioning (i.e., attention and working memory), and behavioral/emotional symptoms of 48 drug-naïve children and adolescents with ADHD (42 boys and 6 girls, age-range 6–16 years, mean age 10.5 ± 2.5 years, mean IQ 101.3 ± 11.2) were studied to assess how these different characteristics affected a single-dose MPH response. Four hierarchical linear regression models were used to explore whether age, neuropsychological measures at baseline, and behavioral/emotional symptoms could predict attention and working memory measures after a single-dose MPH administration. We found that improvement in attention and working memory was predicted by age, neuropsychological measures at baseline, and severity of ADHD symptoms. No behavioral and emotional symptoms predicted single-dose MPH response with the exception of conduct symptoms.

Keywords: methylphenidate; ADHD; behavioral and emotional symptoms; executive functions; conduct symptoms (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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