FSU’s Children’s Learning Clinic celebrates providing free ADHD evaluations, treatments to 500 families

A research clinic at Florida State University has officially served 500 families in the Southeast U.S. with evaluations, diagnoses and treatments for children with ADHD and related disorders — all at no cost.

Since opening its doors in 2015, the Children’s Learning Clinic, part of the Department of Psychology, has helped children with ADHD navigate diagnoses, treatments and daily life while assisting families in learning about their child’s unique strengths and difficulties.

“The clinic offers gold-standard evaluations that specifically look for ADHD and cast a broad net to understand other issues that may be present,” said Leah Singh, CLC director and a licensed psychologist. “It’s extremely humbling and such an honor to be able to serve these families and provide them with resources they need to support their kiddos.”

Nearly one in nine children between the ages of 3 and 17 in the U.S. have been diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD. This number — more than 7 million overall — continues to rise, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, solidifying ADHD as an expanding public health concern for which treatments are limited and short-lived.

Children with ADHD have difficulties with executive function, the neurological activities supported by the prefrontal and frontal areas of the brain that help plan and guide behavior, because these brain regions are underdeveloped. Treatments being developed by the clinic use arcade-style video games that target different brain functions associated with working memory.  As children play the games, they show improvements in learning, impulse control, planning, organizing and emotion regulation.

“We’re fortunate to be able to provide today’s gold-standard assessment and treatment services at no cost to families while they contribute to research that can help thousands or even millions of other families down the road,” said Michael Kofler, CLC founder and a licensed psychologist. “We’re focused on treating the root cause of ADHD instead of its symptoms, and our goal is to develop effective and accessible non-medication options to help kids with ADHD thrive and be the best versions of themselves.”

Treatments at the CLC target and strengthen the brain’s central executive system through the form of arcade-style video games instead of working like medication with benefits that cease once treatment is stopped.

“Our treatments offer significant advantages over existing first-line interventions for ADHD, like medication and behavioral therapy,” Singh said. “We’ve seen tremendous progress in children who participate in our program, and parents often describe the experience as empowering — something that helps their children succeed both in and outside of the treatment study.”

The work in CLC is currently supported by four full-time licensed psychologists, three faculty affiliates, and 13 staff members, doctoral students and interns. The clinic also offers classes to give parents new techniques to help understand and manage some of their children’s symptoms and behaviors and tools to better advocate for their child.

“When my children participated in the training games, I noticed an improvement in their short-term memory skills and ability to retain information,” said Cassie Young, a parent who sought help from CLC. “I could tell they were recalling information faster when they did homework. They loved playing games with CLC’s staff, and everyone made them feel very welcome. We drove three hours one way to participate in the program, and now I’ve recommended it to other families in our area.”

The CLC has received multiple grants from the National Institute of Mental Health, including a $9 million grant in 2022, to expand treatments for pediatric ADHD. For CLC faculty and staff, conducting groundbreaking research alongside compassionate, no-cost evaluation and treatment is all in a day’s work.

“Work with the kids comes in lots of different shapes and sizes; sometimes we’re sitting at a desk doing standardized testing, while other times we’re running around the hallways with them chasing remote cars or playing games like foosball,” Kofler said. “The feedback we get from families is amazing, and it’s truly humbling to know that this many families trust us to provide high quality, evidence-based services. We’re trying to alleviate a critically unmet need in terms of the availability of quality mental health care services, not just in the Big Bend area but across the nation and around the world.”

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FSU Health brings together researchers, educators and clinical partners under one umbrella to transform health and health care in Florida.

To learn more about research conducted at the Children’s Learning Clinic at FSU or for information on how to access CLC resources, visit psy.fsu.edu/clc