Why are ADHD benefits in the firing line?

[FunStork]

I've been seeing this a lot recently.

Feels like the media is very much against ADHD benefits claims.

Why is that the one that seems to be getting all the focus?

Another one from BBC Verify tonight:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c24ym9yd8p6o

Is this an orchestrated campaign?

Because when you list your conditions when applying for PIP, ADHD is at the top because it is in alphabetical order.
There have also been articles about people claiming PIP for acne, and anxiety, an autism.

Funny, that.

It’s getting the focus because of the sharp rise in claims and because it’s a largely “hidden” disability. I have a diagnosis of ADHD, got later in life, but I don’t consider it a disability. It did hinder me educationally and professionally but I developed coping mechanisms.

My son was recently diagnosed with ADHD. Friend said great now you can apply for DLA.
My reply was that he doesn’t need it and wouldn’t get it. She said just exaggerate as that’s what she did for both her kids.

Thats why.

My friend did similar with her child and got dla- she was very pleased with it and has talked about it a lot. Does dla automatically convert to pip or is it reassessed?

I think people are more likely to know ADHD suffers who lead relatively normal lives, holding down jobs etc., so they assume all sufferers of ADHD are like that and question why they need PIP, when in reality there are degrees of ADHD (as I understand it). Whereas one is unlikely to know a paranoid schizophrenic who leads a relatively normal life.

Because if they said they were too many claims for cancer people would be upset.

most illnesses/conditions people are sympathetic about.

if you want to do this sort of campaign you need a condition that the general public don’t believe in.

see also anxiety, autism, etc.

My impression is that autism is viewed very differently from ADHD and anxiety. It’s taken more seriously, if you will.

You really can’t possibly think why?

my ds is 26, he was diagnosed with ADHD as a child. He can’t work - well, he tries and 9/10 he doesn’t get an interview and every time he has got a job he gets fired within 2 weeks.
He can’t organise anything and will probably always need care. He is totally debilitated. He doesn’t function and it’s heartbreaking. He has zero danger awareness and will do terribly dangerous and reckless things and has no idea why they are wrong.

My dd (18) also has adhd but she manages a lot better and although has executive functioning problems and a lack of concentration it’s not as severe as ds.

Ds get the highest rate for both components of PIP. We haven’t applied for dd as she seems to be coping. I don’t think people realise unless they see it how wide a range the symptoms of adhd are. Just because one person has it and manages doesn’t mean the next person is the same.

This is exactly why. ADHD is by far a new disability in today's terms and one that can be easily misdiagnosed in a child with only parental input, who have no doubt googled all the markers. In some cases that I know of, the child doesnt have adhd, they were just spoilt and had no boundaries, the naughty child in effect.

I know someone who gets the DLA higher rate for both elements by saying he wont go to school and she has to brush his teeth. He happily goes to a SEN school and she certainly doesnt manually brush his teeth.

PIP is very hard to get. I imagine that there are people with ADHD who get PIP but they probably have learning disabilities or other serious mental or physical health conditions as well. I seriously doubt there is any one with purely ADHD getting PIP.

It’s almost fashionable in some quarters to self-declare, and therefore there are also a proportion of those who will try and claim benefits under that banner.

Unfortunately this then casts a level of suspicion over the condition and causes more difficulty for those who have it affect their life to a significant degree already.

People need to step away from TikTok neurospicy nonsense and show some thought for those who are battling every day. It’s not a label to collect, for some it’s genuinely limiting for their life.

I don’t see how they can know adhd is the main condition.

when I did my pip form it just asked you to list diagnoses it didn’t ask for which was the main one.

1. Because they cost too much and the UK has far higher numbers of people claiming for ADHD than other countries and they continue to grow.
2. Because there is a substantial number of 18 year olds who could work with the right support getting benefits instead and not working is one of the most disastrous things for mental health. Because they are not getting experience and the work habit young there’s a big risk of them becoming long-term benefit recipients and becoming more and more mentally unwell.

Because so many are claiming ADHD and taking the benefits. I’m not sure how ADHD stops people working and it shouldn’t be classed as a disability! There are other conditions not classed as disabilities but would sit more in that category than ADHD would! (And I’m currently under assessment myself and I would never claim)

I don't know but I'm currently fucking sick and tired of the current media circus demonising it and attacking those of us with it (along with depression/anxiety).

I don't even currently claim pip (I used to, when they misdiagnosed me and medicated me for bipolar for 12+ years-yes that's how severe my anxiety and depression is-they legit though I had bipolar 🫠) and they talk about how "mild" ADHD doesn't deserve help...I scored 8/8 on inattentiveness and 9/12 for hyperactivity so I'd love to know wtf actually qualifies as "severe" 🤔🙄

You know how they have those goggles you can put on to simulate sight loss and blindness? I wish they'd invent some brain equivalent and let someone try and do their job with the shit I'm experiencing on a daily basis. And then let them come back to em and tell me how "it has no affect on their ability to work".

Id love to just "snap out of it" and get on with it, sadly if that was as simple as that is not have been having to live with severe depression (and ADHD) for the past 29 years of my almost 40 year life 😞 I'm sick of hearing about it and sick of seeing people's quite frankly incorrect, inconsiderate and insulting opinions on it.

Oh and yes I do actually work.

Unfortunately only part time. As that's all I can manage as multiple attempts to work more have left me off sick and suicidal and occupational health themselves recommended I can only realistically safely work part time.

There have been some quite dodgy private clinics providing ADHD diagnoses as well, which hasn’t helped people who genuinely have the condition.

But of the 2 people I know who get PIP for ADHD, both are using it to fund their medication as the NHS won’t. And it’s the medication that allows them to work.

Good point. If the nhs will fund the medication needed then that would be a compromise surely ?

Everyone over tbe age of about 35 or 40 is incredibly dismissive of ADHD.

I constantly see posts on here saying that people should only get a diagnosis if they are struggling. What they don’t realise is that ‘struggling” (written in more formal clinical language of course) is literally part of the diagnostic criteria and you won’t get a diagnosis if you do not have significant struggles.

Intellogent women and girls in particular are amazing at hiding their struggles so colleagues and even family members think they are doing fine but they are not.

Yep. The people I know who have ADHD and are on PIP are claiming for other things. They were claiming PIP before they got diagnosed with ADHD.

I do know people whe only have ADHD, and they do work and don't claim anything.

It is really common for women that are late diagnosed with ADHD to have had been given the whole alphabet of diagnoses before ADHD anyway. So they may have been on PIP anyway.

Um, having to go to a SEN school means he is disabled.

I hear this all the time...

...so dodgy that the NHS designated Psychiatry UK (my provider) as the OFFICIAL NHS ADHD service for Kent and Medway? Because they no longer had their own NHS service? 🤔

My assessor is a consultant NHS psychiatrist. Works for the NHS and on the side does assessments for RTC.

So in your opinion. His assessment as an NHS consultant psychiatrist is only valid in a direct NHS setting? And his professional opinion outside of that despite applying the exact same NICE guidance assessment is now invalid due to it being via right to choose? 🤷🏻‍♀️ He's either qualified to assess someone or he isn't?! And if you think he isn't then any direct NHS ADHD assessment he did would also be equally invalid no?

Reassessed and pip is significantly harder to get

You can just rock up tomorrow and get an ADHD diagnosis. It’s just that easy. Then you apply for DLA, and you don’t need any proof at all, you can just write it on a form. Where do you live? Because I need to move there.

My daughter is Autistic, we know she is, there is very little doubt about it. She was on a two year waiting list for CAMHS for a diagnosis but last year they kicked her off because they now only accept young people who have two MH co-morbidities. She gets DLA for her Cerebral Palsy and last time we submitted a 10 page report from her physio confirming her physical limitations, and we were still asked to get a report from an OT confirm how this affected her ability to carry out personal care. Thing is, we don’t have an OT because our local council only has one in the children’s team and she works 3 days a week and our case has never been handed over to her. Luckily, our physio agreed to step in and write a secondary report which she got signed off by the NHS OT team in her office.

Not to mention the fact that not going to school or having help brushing teeth isn't going to make a child eligible for high rate mobility.