title: Two novel CBTs for adolescents with ADHD: the value of planning skills.
abstract: Adolescents with ADHD have planning problems, often affecting school- and social functioning. Evidence-based treatments for adolescents with ADHD are scarce and treatment drop-out rates are substantial. The effectiveness of two new, individual, short-term cognitive behavioral therapies (CBT) was investigated: One with an aim on improving planning skills and one solution-focused treatment (SFT) without such an aim. Motivational Interviewing elements were added to both treatments to enhance treatment compliance. In a multi-center randomized clinical trial, 159 adolescents (12-17 years) with ADHD were randomly assigned to one of both treatments. Pre-, post- and 3-month follow-up data were gathered on five domains: Parent-rated ADHD, planning problems and executive functioning (primary outcomes), neuropsychological measures of planning, comorbid symptoms, general functioning, and teacher measures. Attrition was low in both treatments (5%). Adolescents improved significantly between pre- and post-test with large effect sizes on all domains. Improvements remained stable or continued to improve from post-test to follow-up, also when controlling for medication use. Marginally significant differences were found in favor of the planning-focused treatment: parents and therapists evaluated this treatment more positively than SFT and the planning-focused treatment showed more reduction of parent-rated planning problems. Two new CBTs with integrated motivational components were feasible and attrition was low. ADHD symptoms and co-existing problems of the adolescents improved from pre-test to 3 months after treatment. As the planning-focused treatment was evaluated more positive and had marginal additional beneficial effects to SFT, especially planning-focused CBT seems promising to fill the gap in available treatments for adolescents with ADHD.
authors.affiliation: Department of Developmental Psychology, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Bianca E
authors.initials: BE
authors.lastname: Boyer
authors.forename: Hilde M
authors.initials: HM
authors.lastname: Geurts
authors.forename: Pier J M
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Prins
authors.forename: Saskia
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Van der Oord
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001289:Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy; D015928:Cognitive Behavioral Therapy / Q000379:methods*; D015897:Comorbidity; D056344:Executive Function / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D016896:Treatment Outcome