Health-Related Quality of Life in Methylphenidate-Treated Children with Attention-Deficit–Hyperactivity Disorder: Results from a Taiwanese Sample

Objective: Attention-deficit–hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is the most common neuropsychiatric disorder of childhood. The purpose of the present study was to assess the health-related quality of life (HRQL) in methylphenidate-treated school-age children with ADHD as compared with healthy children in a Taiwanese population. Methods: Subjects were 6–15 years of age with ADHD who were currently receiving methylphenidate treatment (total n = 119). Subjects were compared to 129 healthy children recruited from the community. Child Health Questionnaire Parent Form-50 (CHQ-PF-50), a functional health status measure of HRQL was arranged for parents to complete. Disease-related variables were analysed to determine their relationship and predictive power with HRQL of children. Results: The HRQL of methylphenidate-treated children with ADHD was rated worse than that of community children in all the psychosocial subscales and the Psychosocial Summary Score of CHQ-PF-50. In addition, the problems of ADHD children interfered with family activities and family cohesion significantly. Moreover, improvement of ADHD core symptoms after medication treatment predicted higher psychosocial functioning. This effect was independent of children's current age, age receiving diagnosis, age starting and duration of medication treatment but was not independent of ADHD comorbidity. Conclusion: This study may serve as one of the cross-cultural validations of ADHD as a common concern for children and families worldwide. After methylphenidate treatment, parents of Taiwanese children with ADHD still reported them to have poorer health outcomes than control children across almost all domains of HRQL. Improvement of HRQL should be integrated in the overall treatment plan for children with ADHD.