NHS provides all the required care, advice, and support to all the victims of ADHD irrespective of whether the victim is a child or an adult. It has only qualified professionals that will look after and treat such victims. However, you might prefer to opt for some other way to deal with ADHD. The reasons for this movement/shift can be:

• Lengthy waiting for examination
• Dissatisfaction for the conventional medical treatment for ADHD
• Favor to look for alternative treatments, especially private ones, as the line of thinking is the desire of more concentration and interest shown in the private treatments

Therefore, it perfectly fine if you prefer a specialist or a therapist to treat ADHD. However, be sure you know the meaning of the terms well.

With respect to ADHD, the term ‘therapist’ for the NHS means a clinical psychologist, who actually has obtained a long medical training. Further, the terms therapist and counselor and interchangeably used and you might come across a lot of them while looking for them on the Internet. However, you cannot make out whether they possess any qualification to treat ADHD.

There are experienced and qualified private therapists, but locating them and verifying their qualifications are not that easy.

Hunting for a Therapist

Listed below are the guidelines for finding a therapist so that you do not get cheated by anyone.

Visit Your GP

The first and the most recommended helping hand in looking for a specialist is your local clinical psychology service – the GP. It is the GP who actually refers a specialist and therefore, knows the names and contacts of skilled therapists, such as psychologists; and whether any of them offer private treatments at reasonable cost. You can obtain such information from the secretary of the GP too.

Local Support Group

Try to get a contact with your local ADHD support group, which is another good place to obtain the information of well-qualified therapists.

Verify the Qualifications

After obtaining a list of therapists along with their contact number and addresses, verify their credentials. If the therapist is on an NHS post, you can avoid this task because they are always qualified. Listed below are some dos in the process of verification.

• If you find that the therapist is a member of a main professional organization, try to check about the therapist from that organization.
• If you find that the therapist is not a member of a recognized organization, but have listened to very good comments; think twice at this point of time instead of hurrying and approaching him/her.
• Never be of the opinion that if a therapist is a member of a recognized organization, he/she will be one of the best for the treatment. This is not always true!

Check out for Fees

Generally, the fees of professional private therapy are high. This may range from £25 to £150 per hour depending on the area and the medical success. However, you should be able to look for a therapist who can provide therapy for £40-50 per hour.

Professional Organizations

The recognized organisations can provide you with a list of qualified therapist on their Web sites. You can also complaint about a therapist who is its member on the site and can clear all your doubts regarding the therapy. Listed below are such organizations.

• United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy
  0207 436 3002 and www.psychotherapy.org.uk.
• British Association for Counseling and Psychotherapy
  0870 4435252.
• British Psychological Society
  0116 2549568 and www.bps.org.uk.
• Royal College of Psychiatrists
  0207 235 2351 and www.rcpsych.ac.uk.
• National Council of Psychotherapists (1971)
  0115 913 1382 and www.natcouncilofpsychotherapists.org.uk.
• British Association of Psychotherapists
  Members are psychodynamic therapists of the Freudian or Jungian type. Contact number is 0208 452 9823 and Web site is www.bap-psychotherapy.org.
• British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies
  Here, you can find a qualified cognitive behavior therapist, cognitive therapist, behavior therapist, or a rational emotive behaviour therapist. Contact number is 01254 875277 and the Web site is www.babcp.com.

Communication with the Therapist

Once you choose a therapist, you need to visit him/her. At the meeting, you and therapist both ask questions to each other before planning for the treatment. Let’s go through some of those questions.

Questions of the Therapist

• Describe your family background in detail.
• Is there any medical history of the child? If yes, what is it, what medications were taken, and what were the side effects?
• How your child is being handled in school?
• Describe the behavior of your child in school days.
• Have you noticed any signs of impulsiveness, hyper activeness, and inattention?
• What is the behavior of your child at meals and when there are guests at home?
• How does your child behave with their siblings?
• How is your relationship with the child?
• What are your concerns about the child?

Questions of the Parents

• How long the therapy will be given to my child?
• How many sessions will be there per week?
• If you cancel a session, how we will come to know?
• When will you do the next appraisal of my child?
• Is there some role to be played by me during the sessions?

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