Purpose
The current literature on attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) shows a tangled picture of its etiology and diagnosis. It directs at over-medicalization in ADHD cases due to the pharmaceutical-based models surrounding its treatment. Further, the authors observed the negligible reporting of India’s ADHD scenario in the reviewed literature. Thus, this study aims to explore the status of ADHD in India’s urban setting through a pilot study.
Design/methodology/approach
Social constructivist viewpoint guided this study. The authors conducted the pilot in two phases: face-to-face semi-structured qualitative interviews with 11 mental health professionals in the first phase, and, in the second phase, five mental health professionals responded to an online survey with same questions. After qualitative analysis, four major themes were identified: participants’ opinions on ADHD etiology, issues in diagnosis, social context of ADHD and alternatives to medication.
Findings
The findings highlight the need to re-visit the ADHD narrative in the Indian context. These findings also emphasize future investigation on the medicalization of ADHD in India.
Research limitations/implications
A countrywide epidemiological survey is required to explore the distribution of the disorder to standardize diagnosis and treatment procedures pan-India. This paper is an attempt to iron out the ADHD-related information that needs further exploration and research.
Originality/value
With in-depth interviews of mental health professionals, the study explores the state of ADHD in an urban setting in India. Future research must build on the current findings to establish the etiological and diagnostic framework of ADHD.
In this paper, we report the findings of a qualitative study that, aims to understand the family members’ subjective experiences with perceived stigma of mental illness. The theoretical standpoint and the research method for the study employed are social constructivist theory and narrative inquiry respectively. We conducted semi-structured and in-depth interviews with family members and others accompanying patients to an outpatient unit of a psychiatric clinic. The professionals and the administrative staff at the clinic gave additional interviews. The constant comparative method was employed for the analysis of the narratives. The findings suggest the existence of perceived and direct stigma among family members. Family members shared their concerns relating to the disclosure of illness, its receptions, its interpretation by others, and the possible impact of the disclosure on the family. Professionals and staff at the clinic shared their perceptions regarding the manifestations of perceived stigma among families. In this study, we gathered an emic understanding of family stigma in the context of West Bengal, India. The findings are discussed in the context of current literature on stigma in India.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.