My cousin was diagnosed by a brain scan. She signed up to be part of a clinical trial for something else, got kicked out of the trial because her fMRI showed she had ADHD.

So if we can literally scan someone’s brain and diagnose them from a picture instead of all these vague “describe your symptom” guessing… why don’t we?

It’s quite costly to run an fMRI. Not needed if you can get the same results more or less from a questionnaire.

In my professional experience, it can be hard to tell between ADHD symptoms and CPTSD symptoms. The checklist is not a great way to diagnose people. We usually do a lot more assessments, I also use a computerized test to measure reaction time and error commission.

I wish we (therapists) at least had the option to order an MRI or recommend a doctor orders one in difficult cases (I can do the latter but they will just laugh at me).

Wait, is there an actual chance to “see” ADHD in an MRI image? I was under the impression that we can’t do that (yet) and the only way to diagnose was through questionnaires, attention testing and such. That’s what I was told by the doctor who ultimately diagnosed me two years ago