The effect of adding ferrous sulfate to methylphenidate on attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in children

Attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common psychiatric disorders in children with several complications. This study was conducted to investigate the effect of adding ferrous sulfate to methylphenidate in decreasing ADHD symptoms. This study was a double-blind, randomized clinical trial. In this study, 42 nonanemic children with ADHD and serum ferritin below 30 mg/ml were enrolled according to convenience sampling and randomly assigned to two groups of 21 each, cases and controls. The two groups were matched for age and sex. The case group was administered with ferrous sulfate 5 mg/kg in addition to methylphenidate up to 1 mg/kg and the control group with methylphenidate alone. The scores on child symptoms inventory-4 (CSI-4) were recorded at baseline and after 2 months of treatment. Data were analyzed by t-test, Pearson's correlation coefficient, and repeated measures ANOVA in SPSS 16. The scores on CSI-4 decreased significantly at month 2 in both groups (P < 0.001). The scores on attention deficit and hyperactivity subscales of the CSI-4 were significantly lower in the case group than the control group (P < 0.05). The total score on CSI-4 decreased more markedly in the case group (P < 0.04). Use of ferrous sulfate plus methylphenidate can be effective in reducing ADHD symptoms in nonanemic children with low serum ferritin.

• Publication year

  2017

• Venue

  Journal of Advanced Pharmaceutical Technology & Research

• Publication date

  2017-10-01

• Fields of study

  Medicine

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.4103/japtr.JAPTR_45_17PMID 29184845PMCID 5680621
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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