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Influence of birth month on the probability of Western Australian children being treated for ADHD

Emma Sciberras, Alisha Gulenc and Daryl Efron
Med J Aust 2017; 207 (6): . || doi: 10.5694/mja17.00134
Published online: 18 September 2017

Whitely and colleagues1 reported that children born in June were more likely to receive treatment for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) than children born in July. It is unfortunate that they did not measure the year of school intake, and rather made the assumption that all children entered school at the recommended age. The authors concluded that “there are significant concerns about the validity of ADHD as a diagnosis,” which is a large leap not substantiated by the data presented.


  • 1 Deakin University, Melbourne, VIC
  • 2 University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC
  • 3 Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Melbourne, VIC
  • 4 Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne, VIC



Acknowledgements: 

This research was funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council Project Grant no. 1008522.

Competing interests:

No relevant disclosures.

  • 1. Whitely M, Lester L, Phillimore J, Robinson S. Influence of birth month on the probability of Western Australian children being treated for ADHD. Med J Aust 2017; 206: 85. <MJA full text>
  • 2. Sciberras E, Efron D, Schilpzand EJ, et al. The Children’s Attention Project: a community-based longitudinal study of children with ADHD and non-ADHD controls. BMC Psychiatry 2013; 13: 18.
  • 3. Efron D, Sciberras E, Anderson V, et al. Functional status in children with ADHD at age 6–8: a controlled community study. Pediatrics 2014; 134: e992-e1000.
  • 4. Polanczyk GV, Willcutt EG, Salum GA, et al. ADHD prevalence estimates across three decades: an updated systematic review and meta-regression analysis. Int J Epidemiol 2014; 43: 434-442.

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