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Comment by thesmtsolver | Hacker News Reader

> diagnosed whilst sharing only 3 of the 9 symptoms, whichs admits that each of the symptoms can have a cause that is not from ADHD

It does not logically follow that different symptoms -> different causes.

(Fire can cause smoke, heat, soot, etc. Depending on the wind and other conditions, only some of them may be observable.)

One root cause can manifest in different ways depending on interactions with other factors.

The genetic basis for ADHD is well studied and points to a single set of core causes.

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I have symptoms 1-6, you have symptoms 4-9. We only share 4,5,6. Or I have 1,3,5,6,7,8, you have 2,4,6,7,8,9.

Surely then, each of the symptoms (precieved, subjective symptoms) at that, can exist without ADHD.

So my question is, how do you know I simply dont have multiple completely independent things that together present the 6 symptoms? Even if we are to agree its a genetic condition, the diagnosis of sny particular individual isnt based on genes so theres room for criticism of the diagnostic process

That's where the math ends and clinical diagnosis starts because those number games take you only so far. Furthermore, ADHD is classified into different subtypes so it was never a question of meeting all 9 but only the subset relevant for your own subtype. It's also not diagnosed by ticking of the trait list from the DSM with your doctor but by using recognized clinical questionnaires.

The personal questionnaires, aside from the fact that they're ridiculously easy to game and hardly ever throughly verified, are pointed to answer the crtieria defined by the DSM.

If the DSM isnt what defines ADHD, what is?

The DSM is an international expert collection of acknowledged diseases - it just answers briefly the "what is this?" question, nothing more while the medical societies in your respective country implement the actual guidelines on how to diagnose and treat the diseases by using the recent scientific conclusions. So a MD isn't using the DSM to diagnose and treat you - this is a common misconception.

Yes I understand that. My point is all these guidelines and their implementations are based on the definitions of the DSM.

We don't know, but epidemiological data hints at which one is more likely.

ADHD diagnosis requires "onset" before age 14, yet there is such a thing as acquired ADHD (due to brain damage).

And of course the genes don't change during the latter, nor did they change when the age of onset criteria was raised from 12.

And even though both autism and ADHD was described more than a 100 (and 200) years ago it took a long time for AuDHD to be noticed. (2013)

The maps we have are bad, the territory is treacherous, and even if we assume the genes are unchanging the environment they find themselves in does seemingly faster and faster.

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