Digital Therapies Targeting Neural Markers effective for Children With ADHD, finds study

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a prevalent neurodevelopmental condition characterized by diminished attentional control.

Currently, treatment for ADHD can include both pharmacological and behavioral therapies that reduce ADHD symptoms, but also have several limitations because pharmacological treatments can induce side effects including reduced appetite. There are also barriers to obtaining non-pharmacological interventions.

Critically, these difficulties are related to negative consequences in real-life functioning both during development and into adulthood. There is now growing evidence that modulating the underlying neural circuits related to attention can improve behavior and brain function in children with ADHD. We have previously shown that game-based digital therapeutics targeting a key neural marker of attention–midline frontal theta (MFT)–yield positive effects on attentional control in several populations. However, the effects of such digital therapeutics in children with ADHD and no other comorbidities has not been yet examined. To address this gap, we assessed a sample of 25 children with ADHD (8–12 years old) on neural, behavioral, and clinical metrics of attention before and after a 4-week at-home intervention on an iPad targeting MFT circuitry.

The results of the study are as follows:

Children showed enhancements on a neural measure of attention (MFT power), as well as on objective behavioral measures of attention and parent reports of clinical ADHD symptoms. Importantly, we observed relationships between the neural and behavioral cognitive improvements, demonstrating that those children who showed the largest intervention-related neural gains were also those that improved the most on the behavioral tasks indexing attention.

Thus, the researchers concluded that these findings provide support for using targeted, digital therapeutics to enhance multiple features of attentional control in children with ADHD.

Reference:

"Enhancing neural markers of attention in children with ADHD using a digital therapeutic," by Courtney L. Gallen et al. published online in PLOS One.

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0261981