Brainbalancer's Weblog

An interesting segment appeared on Good Morning America this morning.  It’s entitled Looking Inside Kids’ Minds Can Open the Future.  Worth a read.  It is about testing children diagnosed with ADHD with a Quantitative EEG (electroencephalograph).

Here’s a few points I gleaned…

Dr. Fernando Miranda, a neurologist at the Bright Minds Institute in San Francisco, says diagnosing children with behavioral disorders like ADHD and autism without looking at their brains is like trying to diagnose heart problems without actually looking at the heart.

(my note:  this can actually be done without a QEEG by doing a proper evaluation of a child, but it’s a good analogy)

They went to see Miranda at the Bright Minds Institute, and Miranda took a different approach to treating Danny.

Danny was wired for a qunatitative electroencephalography, or EEG, a very sophisticated test that measures a brain’s electrical output in response to certain stimuli. He also underwent a comprehensive neuropsychological exam, and magnetic resonance imaging of the brain.

<snip>

But the other children’s data yielded some surprises. Zach’s tests showed signs of ADHD but also structural problems in his brain.

“He has an area of lack of development of the hypocampus here. This is a finding that explains some of the problems that he does have sometimes remembering or paying attention,” Miranda said.

That information led Miranda to suggest not only medication but targeted therapy, in this case music lessons, to help teach the other side of Zach’s brain to pick up the slack.

Miranda contends specialized memory excercises that appeal to one particular side of the brain can train it to take over for the slower side.

Megan showed no signs of attention deficits or other brain issues. Miranda suggested simply helping her with her reading. Without this puzzle piece Megan would likely have been put on medication. Mom had assumed that Meagan, the youngest, likely had the same issue as her siblings.

Having evidence behind what was happening to her kids was a comfort to Jensen. “You truly understand what your’e looking at and what’s going on in your kids’ head,” she said. “And Dr. Miranda goes through each piece with you.”

What I found particularly interesting was the acknowledgment of a structural imbalance of the brain requiring specialized exercises to correct.  Hooray for Dr. Miranda and GMA!