In an excerpt from her new book, ‘Under the Henfluence,’ Tove Danovich discusses her ongoing fascination with chickens and the challenge of reconciling the backyard trend with today’s industrial practices.
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March 25, 2011
Over five million children ages four to 17 have been diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in the United States and close to 3 million of those children take medication for their symptoms, according to the Centers for Disease Control. But a new study reported in The Lancet last month found that with a restricted diet alone, many children experienced a significant reduction in symptoms. The study’s lead author, Dr. Lidy Pelsser of the ADHD Research Centre in the Netherlands, said in an interview with NPR, “The teachers thought it was so strange that the diet would change the behavior of the child as thoroughly as they saw it. It was a miracle, the teachers said.”
Dr. Pessler’s study is the first to conclusively say that diet is implicated in ADHD. In the NPR interview, Dr. Pessler did not mince words, “Food is the main cause of ADHD,” she said adding, “After the diet, they were just normal children with normal behavior. They were no longer more easily distracted, they were no more forgetful, there were no more temper-tantrums.” The study found that in 64 percent of children with ADHD, the symptoms were caused by food. “It’s a hypersensitivity reaction to food,” Pessler said.
This is good news for parents and children who would like to avoid many of the adverse side effects associated with common stimulant drugs like Ritalin used to treat ADHD—and bad news for the pharmaceutical industry. The National Institute of Mental Health reports that common side effects from the drugs are sleeplessness (for which a doctor might also prescribe sleeping pills) headaches and stomachaches, decreased appetite, and a long list of much more frightening (yet rarer) side effects, including feeling helpless, hopeless, or worthless, and new or worsening depression. But Pessler’s study indicates that up to two-thirds or two of the three million children currently medicated for ADHD may not need medication at all. “With all children, we should start with diet research,” Pessler said.
There are also questions about the long-term effects of stimulant drugs and growth in children. After three years on Ritalin, children were about an inch shorter and 4.4 pounds lighter than their peers, according to a major study published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in 2007. A 2010 study in the Journal of Pediatrics disputed these findings, but all the study’s authors had relationships with drug companies, some of which make stimulants. According to Reuters, “The lead author, Harvard University’s Dr. Joseph Biederman, was once called out by Iowa Senator Charles E. Grassley for the consulting fees he has received from such drug makers.”
This is just one example of how the powerful billion-dollar drug industry designs and interprets studies to suit their interests. Since the 1970s, researchers not tied to drug companies have been drawing connections between foods, food additives, and the symptoms associated with ADHD but many have been dismissed or overlooked by conventional medicine. One of the earliest researchers in this field was Dr. Benjamin Feingold who created a specific diet to address behavioral and developmental problems in children. The Feingold diet, as it is now called, recommends removing all food additives, dyes, and preservatives commonly found in the majority of industrial foods.
There are a multitude of credible scientific studies to indicate that diet plays a large role in the development of ADHD. One study found that the depletion of zinc and copper in children was more prevalent in children with ADHD. Another study found that one particular dye acts as a “central excitatory agent able to induce hyperkinetic behavior.” And yet another study suggests that the combination of various common food additives appears to have a neurotoxic effect—pointing to the important fact that while low levels of individual food additives may be regarded as safe for human consumption, we must also consider the combined effects of the vast array of food additives that are now prevalent in our food supply.
In Pessler’s study the children were placed on a restricted diet consisting of water, rice, turkey, lamb, lettuce, carrots, pears and other hypoallergenic foods—in other words, real, whole foods. This means that by default the diet contained very few, if any, food additives.
As I see it, there are two factors at work in this study: One being the allergic reaction to the actual foods themselves and the second being a possible reaction to food additives, or combinations of food additives, found in industrial foods. Both certainly could be at play in the results of this study, although the discussion of Dr. Pessler’s study thus far hasn’t addressed the latter issue.
One theme in the discussion of the story has been skepticism from mainstream media—the recent Los Angeles Times article (the only major daily newspaper to cover the study) was very skeptical, if not dismissive. The author writes, “Previous studies have found similar effects, but, like this one, they all had fundamental problems that made it easy for doctors to dismiss them.” NPR interviewer, Guy Raz asked a question invoking this tone as well, “Now, you’re not saying that some children with ADHD should not be given medication, right?” Pessler does say that there are some children and adults who might benefit from pharmaceuticals but her research indicates that far too many are being medicated unnecessarily—and this is the crux of the story.
The Los Angeles Times article ends on this note: “‘To be sure, the prospect of treating ADHD with diet instead of drugs would appeal to many parents,’ Dr. Jaswinder Ghuman, a child psychiatrist who treats ADHD says. ‘But parents who want to give it a try should be sure to consult their child’s physician first, she warned: ‘It’s not that simple to do appropriately.’”
Call me old-fashioned, but changing your child’s diet seems a lot “simpler” than altering his or her brain chemistry with a daily dose of pharmaceuticals. It does takes patience, trial and error, and commitment to complete an elimination diet—taking a pill to target symptoms certainly requires less effort on the part of the doctors, family and child. While no one is denying that ADHD is a complicated web of symptoms with potentially many contributing factors, why not start by examining the most basic and fundamental cornerstone of our health—the foods (and non-foods) we put into our bodies.
March 30, 2023
In an excerpt from her new book, ‘Under the Henfluence,’ Tove Danovich discusses her ongoing fascination with chickens and the challenge of reconciling the backyard trend with today’s industrial practices.
March 20, 2023
I love how we never need a dr.s permission or watch or care when eating a diet of junk food. Just come in monthly for your prescription refill...makes complete sense
Thanks for spreding knowledge! Hopefully after reading this one parent will decide to help their child through proper nutrition instead of comdemning him/her to be permanent dependant on drugs through all their life, as any dependency shackles our true freedom, and that is absolutely something you don't want to do to any child.
For my son, he had allergies to gluten, dairy, cane sugar, and we eliminated all additives. We eat only whole foods, processed as little as possible. We also eat seasonal as much as humanly possible.
Additionally, he is no longer the picky child he used to be, and has learned that he has a lot more food choices to be excited about. He gets a great deal of the vitamins from foods instead of supplements.
I don't have to worry about the side-effects from scary drugs anymore! I love it.
It was much more work for us, and we did have to be aware of what our family was eating. It was, however, worth the work.
There is nothing 'miraculous' about food and I find it amusing that people are so uneducated about healthy eating that they think this way. To me it's no miracle that removing processed food, additives, chemicals and preservatives, and eating a whole foods diet will make a person feel better - it's just common sense! Obviously not to everyone, though. I'm just glad you're sharing articles like this so more people can be exposed to the idea of "Food as Medicine."
It's so sad that we live in a world where drugs and overmedication are more accepted than pure nutrition. Sure it makes sense because everything is driven by money, it's just such a depressing thought. I totally agree with what Matthew said.
Thanks again for sharing this article, I'll definitely be passing it on.
However, I also feel badly for Dr. Pelsser, she has published a study that could impact pharmaceutical company profits, look for her to be vilified in some form or fashion like Dr. Wakefield.
Thanks for the information.
Rachel
A second reason is because most parents need to be educated on how to correctly do an elimination diet and food challenge tests. If you do it incorrectly you are likely to accidentally leave things in your child's diet that cause problems, and ban things that are safe.
The restricted diet consists of water, plain turkey or lamb meat, plain rice, plain pears, a few restricted vegetables (carrots, lettuce), and a daily allocation of rice "milk" artificially fortified to make up for the diet's mineral deficiencies.
The children are permitted a small serving of some foods like potatoes or certain fruits once or twice a week.
The study lasted nine weeks, five of which were spent on the strictest form of the diet. The authors acknowledge that following the restricted diet long-term could cause health problems.
Almost 40% of the initial study children dropped out because they got no benefit from the diet or found it adversely restrictive.
The Los Angeles Times reported,
"In a commentary that accompanied the Lancet study, [Dr. Jasminder Kaur] Ghuman wrote that, while the diet's benefits were impressive, following it for more than five weeks could have detrimental health consequences. [Study lead author Dr. Lidy] Pelsser is the first to admit that no one can follow such a severe diet for very long. The children in her study have been gradually adding foods back to their diet."
I'm pretty sure a large number of the kids in this study never were ADHD at all. This sort of search for easy answers almost always ends up leading nowhere.
I am sick of parents and doctors being glorified drug dealers when something as simple as feeding the child REAL, WHOLE food will work just as well. The diet will also make the child healthier in the long run.
If this article appeals to you, read a book called Sugar Blues by William Dufty. I think it is out-of-print, but available used from various places on the Internet (I checked). It's very eye-opening.
Actually, it doesn't require a full-blown allergic reaction to produce the effects. Below the level of a full-blown allergy, you can have an INFLAMMATORY reaction. Some of the proteins in even a "natural" food such as the gluten in whole wheat can leak through holes in the gut incompletely digested, get attacked by histamines as in an allergic reaction, and turn the gluten into gluteomorphin (similar to morphine) and cause inattentiveness. As it happens, gluten is a protein that food manufacturers particularly like to extract, refine, and add to very many foods that it would normally have nothing to do with. When added to breakfast cereal they call it "barley malt flavoring." In other foods it's called "modified food starch."
In case you're wondering how I know all this, I used to be autistic and have all the witness/photographic evidence to prove it that any medical researcher could want. Nobody cares.
"Used to be autistic?"
#1 There is no "used to be"; the genes don't work like that
#2 ADHD and autism are not the same thing
for one thing:
ADHD doesn't affect IQ
Autism does
This article would be more appropriately called "It's not ADHD, it the food, stupid!"
I'm sure this is what you were getting at but as you can see all of the rest of the stupid people in the comments section don't understand that.
Kind of a slap in the face to the real ADHDers.