From the classroom to the clinic: a pedagogical perspective on attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in Mexican children and adolescents

Abstract

Attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is the most frequently diagnosed neurobehavioral condition of childhood, and the classroom, not the consulting room, is usually where its consequences are first noticed. In Mexico, school-based screening studies using the Conners 3 scale have identified probable ADHD in roughly one in six primary school children, yet fewer than three in four screened-positive families ever complete a full evaluation, and among children who do reach specialized services, seven in ten receive a diagnosis later than clinically desirable. This narrative review synthesizes epidemiological, neurobiological, and educational evidence generated chiefly in Mexican and Latin American populations to examine ADHD from a pedagogical standpoint, and how the disorder disrupts executive, academic, and socio-emotional functioning, how teachers function, in practice, as the earliest and most consistent filter for detection, despite receiving little formal training in neurodevelopmental disorders and despite a demonstrated tendency to under-recognize the quieter, inattentive presentations more common in girls, how family explanatory beliefs and a fragmented referral pathway between schools and specialized mental health services compound these delays, and how Mexican specific tools and programs, including the FX-II functional-impairment scale and the CLS-R-FUERTE school-based training program, are beginning to close this gap. We argue that improving outcomes for Mexican children with ADHD depends as much on strengthening the bridge between the education and health sectors as on any further refinement of pharmacological treatment, which is already comparatively well established, and propose specific, evidence-consistent elements of an integrated pedagogical-clinical model adapted to Mexican public education.