My mum is a Special Education teacher, so I get to hear about all the learning difficulties and conditions (lucky me). Sothing that came up in one of the conferences she attened recently was that a HUGE number of kids with ADHD end up being diagnosed with schizophrenia soon after leaving school. As there is very little information about what actually causes ADHD (genetics? chemical imbalance?) there is a growing opinion among teachers that ADHD is actually mild schizophrenia.

Here comes the interesting bit. Schizophrenia is a mental illness. A lot of people are afraid of labeling children as mentally ill. Imagine the court cases: "I couldn't get a job because I've always been told I was nuts. Turns out I'm not." Imagine getting diagnosed with schizophrenia when you're 9. Good luck getting into any subject other than "Basic English" when you get to high school. What happens if it was just hormones? Everyone gets them and acts a bit weird for a few years, but there would be a danger of this being mistaken for a mental illness, which as well as being a medical term is also a LEGAL term.

So faced with that scenario, it is really easy to tell parents "You're kid's got ADHD. Get them to take 1 pill, three times a day." (And wait a few years to see if they really ARE nuts so it won't be my problem)