LadyJean, I know many people whose fractures were misdiagnosed as sprains and vice versa, and sometimes cultural or other biases were part of the reason. All of medicine is inexact, and it depends to some degree on interpretation, human decision, and educated guesses. Yes, psychiatry is less "exact" than some other branches of medicine, and often involves more subjective judgment.   But that doesn't make it worthless or ineffective.

You know, millions of people each year are inappropriately prescribed antibiotics for viral infections, which don't respond to antibiotics. There are a variety of reasons for this, some reasonable and some not. Some of these people become seriously ill or even die as a result of reactions to the antibiotics. Does that mean that we should stop giving antibiotics to people with serious bacterial infections, in which they can be lifesaving? Of course not. But that same reasoning is often used to argue against treating children for ADHD.   

The fact that some things are gray doesn't mean you can't distinguish between black and white.

Sorcha is absolutely right. Most people with ADHD need more treatments than just medication, especially because many of them have other things going on in addition to ADHD, like learning disorders, anxiety, or depression. But in many if not most cases, those other treatments become much more effective if the ADHD symptoms are controlled with medication. It's a lot easier to provide educational interventions for a child with a learning disability if he's able to listen to what his teacher is telling him to do, instead of trying to see how far he can roll his pencil across his desk.

Aloha,
Mark