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ADHD has long been considered a disorder that primarily affects children. Today we know that around three percent of adults also suffer from it. However, ADHD in seniors has hardly been researched. A grievance.
Doris Surber sits at her dining table in the Zurich Oberland and talks about the moment she realized that she probably had ADHD. «I read an article in the “Swiss Family” that lists the symptoms of ADHD. “So many things went right,” she says.
It was ten years ago and Doris Surber was about to retire. But she has had the symptoms since she was little: she is easily distracted, often loses track of the conversation, and has difficulty concentrating.
Legend:
Doris Surber has ADHD – and only found out about it when she retired.
ZVG
And then there is this inner unrest: During the interview, Doris Surber constantly plays with the ballpoint pen. A substitute act. Because adults with ADHD have often learned to channel their restlessness, the hyperactivity of ADHD.
Exercise is also one of the strategies that adults adopt to live with ADHD. And a clear daily structure.
Aging can be dramatic for those with ADHD
However, many of these compensation mechanisms falter with age. The daily structure disappears when you retire. The body can no longer keep up with all the movement. There is a lack of energy to complete all the tasks that pile up because you have been putting them off.
“For those affected by ADHD, the loss of structures as they get older can be dramatic,” explains Ana Buadze, senior physician at the Zurich University Psychiatric Hospital, who specializes in ADHD in adults.
A possible consequence: those affected despair of themselves and fall into depression. Which is then treated as depression and not as a secondary disorder of ADHD. This means that the cause of the depression remains unresolved – which makes sustainable treatment difficult. Especially in older patients, there is also a risk that AHDS will be incorrectly interpreted as dementia. And also treated incorrectly.
Clarification is necessary
Studies estimate that around three percent of the adult population is affected by ADHD. Extrapolated, that would be over 55,000 people over 65 in Switzerland. That’s why psychiatrist Ana Buadze calls for education – among the general public as well as among experts. The stigma surrounding mental illness is still widespread, especially among the older generation.
Patients from the older generation sometimes ask me after the diagnosis: “Am I crazy now?”
Doris Surber also had to overcome herself to have her ADHD diagnosed. “I thought, now I still have it,” she says. Psychiatrist Ana Buadze knows this: “Patients from the older generation sometimes ask me after the diagnosis: ‘Am I crazy now?’.”
No approved medications
ADHD is treated with medication, psychotherapy and behavioral training for everyday life. However, this is not without problems. There are no ADHD medications that are approved for people over 65 – because the medications were tested on 18 to 65 year olds. It may therefore be the case that the health insurance company does not cover the costs.
Meanwhile, Doris Surber takes medication, sometimes regularly, sometimes less. Her husband Rolf attests: “When she takes her medication, she is significantly calmer and more concentrated.”
Doris and Rolf Surber are still learning how to deal with the diagnosis and medication. But it’s a relief for both of them to now have a name for the things that don’t really work in everyday life: ADHD – in old age.