Teaching attentional awareness and control in ADHD

ABSTRACTADHD is a highly prevalent disorder that creates significant professionalsocial and personal difficulties for the patientsthere is a real need for additionalnon pharmacological treatmentsThe target of our product is inconsistent control of sustained attentionan important remediation target for ADHD with major real life impactSustained attention is related to symptom severity and correlated with real life functions such as readinglisteningdriving and work safetySustained attention measures and inattention symptoms in ADHD have also been correlated with academic achievementOur Sustained Attention ControlSACteaching approach is quite different frombrain trainingmethods and uses an innovativepatentedapproach based on models and evidence based studies of experiential learningIt includesessential teaching factorsidentified in the literature for promoting meaningful learning and transferthat differentiate us from existing productsTableCommercialization PlanBetter transfer can occur when a conceptual understanding of attentional controlself awareness and metacognitive skills are developedIn a previous Phase I project we built a prototype of our SAC teaching mobile software and tested it in a full RCTdouble blindactive controlstudynWe found significantly greater improvements in the SAC group than the active Control group on both primary outcome measuresa sustained attention measureConners CPT RT Variabilityand time limited reading comprehensionNelson Denny Reading Testdemonstrating far transfer to a standardized test of an important real life activity impaired in adults with ADHDBased on exit interviews from that study we conducted additional design work and extensive customer research that revealed that adults with ADHD need an additional step of training that develops metacognitive skills for applying their attentional awareness to daily lifeIn answer to this needwe designed the Learning To Transfer modulePhase I of this Fast Trackwith the expectation thatwhen integrated with SACPhase II of this Fast Trackit will amplify our prior far transfer resultsThe exit interviews also identified areas for improvement of the SAC modules related to UX and motivation adherence to be built in Phase IIWe willPHASE I AimBuild and test the Learning To TransferLTTmodulea complex attentive listening task simulating daily life listening challengeswith performance feedbackPHASE IIAimIntegrate LTT into the SAC teaching programBuild software tools to improve UX ease of useadd a training exercise and increase skins for varietyimprove difficulty levelingadd new prescriptive tool for reflection and applications of learning to daily life activitiesPHASE IIAimTest the efficacy of fully integrated prototypeexpanded SAC LTTwith a RCTdouble blindactive control study withparticipantsusing an Intention To Treat designwith outcome measures for far transferNelson Denny Reading ComprehensionSTISIM Driving Simulator testWoodcock Johnson Oral ComprehensionBAARS IV SymptomsNarrativeAttention Deficit Hyperactivity DisorderADHDis a highly prevalent disorder incurring billions of dollars of economic impact annually and treated primarily by pharmacological methodsThere is a real need for additionalnon pharmacological treatmentsThis project is aimed at demonstrating the efficacy of an innovative new product that uses mobile apps and web based tools to improve attentional control in adults with ADHD