Thanks to evidence gathered in the East Midlands, a pioneering project to support diagnosis of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in children has been selected to be spread across England supported by the AHSNs as a priority national adoption and spread programme.

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a behavioural disorder that includes symptoms such as inattentiveness, hyperactivity and impulsiveness and affects around 5% of school-aged children worldwide. In the UK children can wait on average 18 months from their first appointment to receiving a formal ADHD diagnosis. The annual cost of ADHD assessments to the NHS is estimated at around £23m.

The Academic Health Science Network’s Focus ADHD intervention uses technology created by international health technology company Qbtech Ltd. The technology, QbTest, measures a patient’s attention, impulsivity and motor activity all at the same time. These indicators are core symptoms of ADHD and accurate measurement adds objectivity to support timely diagnosis.

The intervention has been selected following a demonstrator project across seven NHS sites in the East Midlands which showed a reduction in time to diagnosis by an average of 153 days. Using this intervention was also shown to increase staff capacity by reducing the number of appointments needed for diagnosis and by ruling out ADHD sooner for ambiguous cases. Releasing capacity of clinicians can help reduce waiting lists, improve treatment and allow more time to concentrate on complex cases

There are 15 Academic Health Science Networks (AHSNs) across England, commissioned by NHS England, NHS Improvement and the Office for Life Sciences to spread innovation at pace and scale – improving health and generating economic growth. Each AHSN works across a distinct geography serving a different population in each region enabling adoption and spread of innovation across the country.

With the support of the AHSNs, QbTest has already spread to 41 NHS trusts and 73 sites in England (June 20), but following a selection process which required robust evaluation and results, the intervention will be given further resources and support to spread across a much wider area – with the potential to reach a much larger amount of children and families.

The AHSNs are tasked with evaluating and spreading proven innovations that answer some of the country’s most pressing health and care challenges - the Focus ADHD initiative is an example of this. As outlined in the NHS Long Term Plan, published in January 2019, there is a commitment by the NHS to improve children and young people’s mental health services which includes reducing waiting times for specialist services and supporting children, young people and their families through the diagnostic process.

AHSNs will work with their local NHS organisations to embed the Focus ADHD intervention to sites in their region to save the NHS money and improve patient experience and outcomes through a reduction in time to diagnosis.