The complexities of everyday life and healthcare utilization in Danish children with ADHD: A mixed methods study

PURPOSE: To explore and describe everyday life and hospital-based healthcare experiences and utilization in families of children with ADHD in Denmark.

DESIGN AND METHODS: The present work is a multistage, mixed methods study. The design consists of three individual studies: a meta-synthesis, a focused ethnographic study, and a historical cohort study.

RESULTS: The integrated findings show that: 1) parental stressors affect everyday life and hospital-based service use; 2) parents have concerns for their child from early childhood and fight to have their concerns recognized; and 3) healthcare professionals are important for parents to navigate the persistent challenges of everyday life.

CONCLUSIONS: Having a child with ADHD pervades everyday life and children with ADHD use more medical and psychiatric services in hospitals during the first 12 years of life than children without ADHD. The findings demonstrate a vulnerable everyday life experience and highlight the importance of the families being recognized, accepted, and respected in hospital-based healthcare services from early childhood.

PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS: Healthcare professionals need to recognize the challenges the family of a child with ADHD faces and to acknowledge that ADHD pervades all aspects of everyday life and all other healthcare issues. It is important for healthcare professionals, regardless of specialty, to engage with individual families and to positively contribute to the medical and psychiatric healthcare experience.