Parenting the Active Child, now called Parents Empowering Kids, focused on children aged eight to 12 with ADHD. This program aimed to help parents notice and reward good behaviour; ignore challenging behaviours (such as whining and complaining); use time outs effectively; prepare children for transitions; and collaborate with schools. Parents were given a handbook, a video and a behaviour chart, which were supplemented with weekly telephone sessions with a coach. Parents completed the program in slightly less than seven months.

The Parenting the Active Child led to benefits for children. Approximately 65% of intervention children were diagnosis free at 5 1⁄4-month follow-up, compared to 40% of controls. The high remission rate for controls may have been due, in part, to these children receiving mental health treatments outside of the study — such as behavioural interventions — at significantly higher rates than intervention children. Despite this, intervention children still had more than 2.7 times the odds of not having an ADHD diagnosis by final follow-up. For more information, see Vol. 14, No. 2 of the Children’s Mental Health Research Quarterly.