This paper reviewed published studies on treating ADHD in children whose parents also have ADHD symptoms. The people studied were parents, mostly mothers, and their children with ADHD. The children ranged from preschool age up to one study of teenagers.
Most of the studies suggested that a parent's own ADHD symptoms make behavior-based treatments work less well for the child. In one large study that followed children for three years (485 children, average age 11.9), parents with high inattention had children who improved less in ADHD symptoms, daily functioning, and reading, and this held true no matter which treatment the child received. After a short parent training program, mothers with more ADHD symptoms reported less improvement in their child's difficult behavior and showed more negative parenting when they were observed.
The authors said the evidence on whether a parent's ADHD changes how a child responds to medication was too small and too mixed to draw any conclusions. They also said that treating a parent's ADHD may not be enough on its own to improve parenting or the child's outcomes.
The authors suggest that parent training could be adapted for parents who have ADHD, and that families where both the parent and the child have ADHD are likely to need treatment aimed at both.
Source: Christine H. Wang, Heather Mazursky-Horowitz, Andrea Chronis‐Tuscano. Delivering Evidence-Based Treatments for Child Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Context of Parental ADHD. Current Psychiatry Reports (2014). doi:10.1007/s11920-014-0474-8