ATTENTION DEFICIT DISORDERS
ADHD can best be diagnosed by a thorough examination of person's developmental history and current response style.

Interviews, rating scales, observations, and objective tests are necessary to determine the extent of problems of inattention, impulsiveness, and hyperactivity. Learning disabilities, conduct disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, anxiety, depression, obsessive thinking or compulsive behavior often must be addressed for persons diagnosed with ADHD. Thus, a comprehensive treatment program is often necessary for our clients. Our multi-modal approach may include:

• Evaluating and understanding the specific pattern of attention and impulse control issues using the IVA Plus-the Integrated Visual and Auditory Continuous Performance Test.
    
• Evaluating and understanding the specific learning pattern of looking, listening and doing skills by analyzing results of intelligence tests and neuropsychological testing.
    
• Educating the client, family, school, or employer about ADHD and its impact.
    
• Planning accommodations at home, school or job which maximize success.
    
• Developing behavior management strategies for parents, teachers, or employers.
    
• Facilitating adjustment at home using individual and family therapy.
    
• Maintenance and advocacy once the situation is stabilized.
    
• Learning to socialize appropriately with peers and family.
    
• Evaluating treatment & medication effects using rating scales and the IVA CPT Test.

In our newly opened learning center, FOCUS through FUN Inc., we use cutting edge programs to improve basic attention, learning, and cognitive processing skills using Play Attention and BrainTrain learning tools. This helps by:

• Teaching self-control, attention and focus using cognitive-behavioral procedures.
    
• Improving attention and self-control using Play Attention, featuring EEG neurofeedback and specially trained direction and insturuction from Certified Play Attention Coaches., This is known as Edufeedback.

  
OPPOSITIONAL DEFIANT DISORDERS
ODD - Many children brought for treatment have uncooperative, oppositional, and avoidant behavior.

Often these youngsters are stressed by their under-confidence or inability to respond successfully to life's demands, due to factors of inborn temperament, learning style, attention patterns, family life, and school pressure. They are caught up in a self-defeating struggle filled with anger and frustration with their families, teachers, and peers. They want to succeed, but are more likely to be uncooperative than cooperative. Refusing to try is a typical response. Oppositional behaviors are often used to lessen or eliminate demand, thereby enabling the child to have more control over his/her environment. Attention-getting, stimulation seeking, and annoying behaviors occur repeatedly. However, this frequently occurs in the face of punishment and criticism and at the expense of lowered self-esteem. A major function of treatment is to identify and reverse this process, using combined individual and family treatment as well as parent training groups.

Treatment begins with an assessment of the child's unique temperament and circumstance through a series of interviews, observations, tests and measurements. Once there is an understanding of how the child perceives the world and the tools the child has to deal with it, the therapist and family collaborate to develop a treatment plan. The parents' are taught to be calm, to use their understanding of the child to modify the environment and their own behavior. Accommodating to the child's temperament often is a major step towards eliminating the defiance. Rebuilding the relationship comes next through the use of enjoyable parent child activities, often referred to as special playtime. Behavior management procedures are used to establish clear rules and structure, often jointly negotiated between parent and child. The aim of discipline is to prepare the child for the next time a similar problem arises; planning is emphasized over punishment. Assistance is provided to help all family members remain calm and consistent
ANXIETY  DISORDERS
Dr. Kaufman’s TENSION/ATTENTION Program
In the summer of 2004, a youngster said to me:
“When I Get A Tension, I Lose Attention”
At first I was confused,
but then I realized the brilliant insight I had just been given: negative emotions
can destroy your ability to think clearly and lead to anxiety and avoidance.
So here is what is true:

 When A Tension Gets Your Attention
If a tension gets your attention
It can take away your attention
Or it can give you a tense shun
Or maybe even as many as ten shuns
And that is an Intention Problem
Not an Attention Problem and
Hopefully it won’t become
a Detention Problem

 The Keys to Overcoming This Are
Learning effective and reliable self-calming skills
So you can better control your thoughts and your actions
In ways that help you and succeed rather than avoid
No one wants mistakes or failures
But once they have happened they can’t be changed,
But the future has not yet happened so you can use the present
To make it be more the way you want.  

ACCEPT THE PAST, UNDERSTAND THE PRESENT
 and
COMMIT TO MAKING YOUR FUTURE BETTER

Learn How to Improve Your Ability to be Calmer and

Practice  Practice  Practice  Practice  Practice  Practice  Practice  Practice          Practice    Practice   Practice   Practice   Practice    Practice    Practice

Self -Calming Skills

 The ACTUAL TENSION/ATTENTION PROGRAM

I do 5 to 10 sessions with the child and the parents together. In these IBH office sessions, we do many activities designed to “crystallize” what tension and nervousness are and how to control and change it. The Children and Parents are given Homework to Practice their new Self-Calming Skills together at home between T/AT sessions. Typically, after doing the T/AT with me, the kids immediately go into FOCUS through FUN to do their FTF Session. So many kids do so much better in there after they have done (T/AT) relaxation exercises with me.

In these therapy sessions, I always give the child a You Are In Control of Me Time (YAICOM) before we start any new Tension/Attention activities. They often chose to do Brain Toss, eventually following what is called the “Ralphie Rules” (see below in Office Session 5). Here is what we do. I softly toss a Little Rubber “Brain Toy” to the child and they love to catch it. I tell them that in 2004 a boy told me that if you catch it with one hand, you don’t have to do anything, but if you catch with 2 hands, everyone in the room should do the breathing, and if you make a throw or a catch which is not perfect you should say “I should do it better the next time.”  

• Office Session 1:  The child and the parent (can include any other available family members-2nd parent, grandparent, or siblings age 4 and older) listen to the “I Can Relax CD”- a 25-minute tense/release relaxation exercise activity. We(me too) all do the exercises together

           Homework 1: Listen to the ““I Can Relax CD”- at home together and Practice Daily 

• Office Session 2:  If they have practiced, the child (and sometimes the parent) do an EMG Biofeedback Session with me to “crystallize” and better understand what tension is and that they can change it and control it.

Homework 2:  Listen to the ““I Can Relax CD”- at home together and Practice Daily 

• Office Session 3: If families have practiced together and if the kids are cooperating, they are given the Family Self-Calming Assignment. All family members present are asked to Breathe Slowly and Deeply, 5 times a day for one minute, in already calm situations. This is Practice, not treatment. This is the assignment that is typically given to the parents in the 7^th Session of the Calm Parent Group Program. During this session, we often do more EMG or sometimes Temperature biofeedback with an Autogenic Training CD.

Homework 3:  Do the Family Self-Calming Assignment Daily 5 times a day together in situations where you are already calm. Breath slowly and deeply for a Minute. 

• Office Session 4: We discuss the effects of stressful thoughts on tension. We listen to a portion of a CD called Positive Thoughts for Children. I discuss my program, “Paying for Saying and Thanking for Thinking,” where kids and parents write out 100 positive statements together and then the child is REWARDED for READING the statements out loud to their parent or REPEATING the statements to the parents after the parent reads them.  The parent is then instructed to give their child Enthusiastic Descriptive Praise any time they hear their child speak positively or optimistically in real-life situations.

Homework 4: The child is encouraged to listen daily to the Positive Thoughts for Children CD. The family is encouraged to do the “Paying for Saying and Thanking for Thinking.” 

• Office Session 5: We often do “Brain (or Tennis Ball) Toss Therapy ”with the child and his parents and or brothers or sisters. So many kids and family members love this because this gives them them the opportunity to practice at home turning Calmness and Optimism. 

      Homework 5: Continue Family Self Calming and Listen to any relaxation CD you still have. 

• Office Sessions 6 and beyond depends upon the child’s need. We may repeat any of the prior activities, although Brain Toss is often most wanted and it does exactly what it is supposed to do, crystallizing Relaxation. For some kids, we discuss, their “Lost Its,” and we teach them how to analyze their Lost Its and them into “Saved Its” and “Didn’ts”

            Homework 6 and beyond also depends on the need. I encourage the parents to do a “Lost It Analysis,” if their kids have a “Lost it.”