This ADHD Awareness Month we are highlighting the work taking place across the region to transform attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) services.

Demand for adult ADHD services has increased significantly in recent years. Many individuals face long waiting times for assessment and limited support following diagnosis.

Services often vary between areas, and pressure on clinical teams can make it difficult to respond effectively to growing need. 

We are supporting local health systems to adopt and test a new adult ADHD pathway. The pathway was developed by colleagues at Health Innovation North West Coast and their local stakeholders.

The pathway aims to:

• improve access to support.
• strengthen the role of primary care.
• provide more personalised, needs-based care.

Digital technologies also offer potential to enhance the pathway, by streamlining assessment processes, enabling more consistent follow-up, and providing tools that help manage the day-to-day challenges people with ADHD experience.

Health Innovation East Midlands Programme Director Eddie Alder said: “The potential for these changes to improve access and outcomes for local people over the next 2-3 years is tremendous. It is early days and the changes will take time to become reality.

“We are supporting health systems, through their ICS clusters, to explore strategy development and map their current pathways across the whole system from self-care, to primary care and specialist services.

“Introducing new ways of working will reduce NHS waiting times and the amount of money that the NHS currently spends on private tests and assessments through Right to Choose.”

Introducing digital tools 

In addition to transforming service pathways, Health Innovation East Midlands is also supporting NHS organisations to adopt digital tools to improve the support available to people who are waiting for assessments or recently diagnosed.

We have developed an online platform to share innovations in this field that have been market ready tested. The platform helps NHS staff to see how each product might benefit their service.

It focusses currently on adult ADHD services, but will expand next year to include innovations that support children and young people’s services.

Some health trusts in our region are already trialling some of the products featured on there. For example, we are supporting:

• Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust's Neurodevelopmental Specialist Service (NeSS) to implement and evaluate a digital platform from Zendra Health to help streamline their pathway and speed up assessment and diagnosis.
• Derbyshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust to explore digital opportunities to make accessing and using ND services easier.

These projects form part of wider efforts across the East Midlands to ensure people with ADHD can access timely assessments, high-quality support and consistent care, regardless of where they live.

By bringing together service transformation, workforce development and digital innovation, the programme aims to create more sustainable ADHD services that improve outcomes for patients and make the best use of NHS resources.

For more information visit our webpage.