Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Exercise, food and other supports
If you are going to take supplements, it is worth paying a small subscription to a service that assays what is actually in them. ConsumerLab is one, at roughly sixty dollars a year.
The thing to check about any such service is who funds it, because a tester paid by manufacturers is a marketing department with a laboratory attached. Look for label accuracy, how much active ingredient was actually found, and where the money comes from. Then pick a brand and stay with it instead of buying whatever is cheapest that week.
Qur’an and Sunnah
God has given him great knowledge and stature (Quran 2:247), said when people wanted to judge a leader by his wealth instead. What a source knows and who pays for it are better grounds than how well it presents itself.
وَقَالَ لَهُمۡ نَبِيُّهُمۡ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ قَدۡ بَعَثَ لَكُمۡ طَالُوتَ مَلِكࣰ اۚ قَالُوٓاْ أَنَّىٰ يَكُونُ لَهُ ٱلۡمُلۡكُ عَلَيۡنَا وَنَحۡنُ أَحَقُّ بِٱلۡمُلۡكِ مِنۡهُ وَلَمۡ يُؤۡتَ سَعَةࣰ مِّنَ ٱلۡمَالِۚ قَالَ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ ٱصۡطَفَىٰهُ عَلَيۡكُمۡ وَزَادَهُۥ بَسۡطَةࣰ فِي ٱلۡعِلۡمِ وَٱلۡجِسۡمِۖ وَٱللَّهُ يُؤۡتِي مُلۡكَهُۥ مَن يَشَآءُۚ وَٱللَّهُ وَٰسِعٌ عَلِيمࣱ
Their prophet said to them, ‘God has now appointed Talut to be your king,’ but they said, ‘How can he be king over us when we have a greater right to rule than he? He does not even have great wealth.’ He said, ‘God has chosen him over you, and has given him great knowledge and stature. God grants His authority to whoever He pleases: God is magnanimous, all knowing.’
Qur’an 2:247read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
It helps to remember what trials actually test. In a double blind trial in adults with ADHD, a broad vitamin and mineral formula produced modest improvement over placebo, more clearly on clinician ratings than on the adults' own ratings. What was tested was one defined formulation, so the finding only travels as far as a product that genuinely matches it.
Rucklidge JJ, Frampton CM, Gorman B, Boggis A. (2014). Vitamin-mineral treatment of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder in adults: double-blind randomised placebo-controlled trial.. The British journal of psychiatry : the journal of mental science doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
When the label cannot be trusted, an independent test is the only thing standing between you and a guess.
This one is still a draft. It is waiting on a scholar and a clinician to read it before it is published.
Near this one
When a parent is set on something that will not hold, one honest story often lands better than a pile of studies. A family finished the better part of a year of neurofeedback and watched their child slide back to where he started within weeks.
One senior researcher in this field is approached by ADHD app startups roughly once a month and no longer takes part, on the view that the companies are not seriously trying to build something that works.
Kava can damage the liver at a high enough dose, badly enough that some countries have banned it. Herbal is not a synonym for gentle.