- Home
- Assessments
- ADHD (Vanderbilt)
Vanderbilt ADHD Assessment (Parent Form), Explained
Asked to “fill out the Vanderbilt”? This page explains what is on it. You rate 47 behaviors from the past six months, plus eight performance items, and your pediatrician counts rather than adds them up.
- 55 items
- Ages 6-12
- Parent report
Available through care
This questionnaire is published by the American Academy of Pediatrics, and we don't publish it here. If it is relevant to your child's care, your Emora clinician may use it as part of their assessment.
Get a comprehensive evaluationPublic version of the questionnaire is available from the publisher.
What a NICHQ Vanderbilt score can and cannot tell you
The NICHQ Vanderbilt parent form is the ADHD rating scale most pediatricians use, for ages 6 to 12.
Diagnosing ADHD requires the teacher form and a clinical evaluation as well. The parent form alone is one of three pieces.
Wherever it is used, a rating scale is a screen, not an assessment. A clinician reads it alongside a history, an interview, and often a second rater such as a teacher or the other parent before drawing any conclusion.
About the Vanderbilt assessment
The NICHQ Vanderbilt Assessment Scale is the ADHD rating form used across pediatric primary care. It comes from the American Academy of Pediatrics and NICHQ, adapted from the Vanderbilt Rating Scales by Mark L. Wolraich, MD. The parent version asks about 47 behaviors over the past six months. That covers the 18 core ADHD symptoms, plus questions about oppositional defiant disorder (ODD), conduct disorder, and the anxiety and low mood that often come with ADHD. Eight more items ask about school and relationships, because an ADHD diagnosis requires that symptoms cause real problems.
Vanderbilt scoring counts items: it does not add them together into a single score. An item counts when the behavior is rated as occurring “often” or “very often.” Each screen has its own number of counted items to meet: inattentive, hyperactive and impulsive, oppositional, conduct, and anxiety and depression. Every one of them also needs at least one performance area at school or at home rated as a problem. Those thresholds are printed on the form itself, and a completed form is read one count at a time against them.
A count above a threshold is not a diagnosis. Diagnosing ADHD takes the parent form, the teacher form, your child’s history, and a clinical evaluation. We do not publish the Vanderbilt for you to fill in here. The form comes from its publisher, or from the clinician who asked for it. Our child psychologists run full ADHD evaluations online, usually within days of sign-up.
How the Vanderbilt is scored
You count items on the Vanderbilt rather than adding them up. An item counts when you rate the behavior at the top of the frequency scale. Each screen needs its own number of counted items, plus at least one performance item rated as a problem. The thresholds are printed on the form.
Adding every answer into one number is the most common mistake made with this form, and the scoring rules have no use for that figure. Symptoms on their own do not meet a screen either. The performance questions are there to show whether the behavior is causing real trouble at school or at home.
The parent form is one of three pieces. A diagnosis also needs the teacher form, your child’s history, and a clinical evaluation.
A screener is not a diagnosis. Cutoffs are set to catch more than they miss, so a high score is a reason to talk to a clinician, not an answer.
Common questions
No. We do not publish the form on this page. It is available from its publisher, and a pediatrician or an Emora clinician will provide the copy they use.
From the clinician who asked for it, or from the publisher. The current edition is sold through the American Academy of Pediatrics, and NICHQ points to the AAP for it. If a pediatrician asked you to complete one, they will usually hand you the copy they use, along with the teacher version.
Count items rated often or very often, screen by screen, rather than adding everything into one number. Each screen has its own threshold, printed on the form, and every screen also requires at least one performance area rated as somewhat of a problem or problematic.
The NICHQ Vanderbilt is validated for ages 6 to 12. For teens, clinicians often use the SNAP-IV, which covers ages 6 to 17; adults are assessed with different measures such as the ASRS.
Because ADHD rarely travels alone. Up to half of children with ADHD also have oppositional or anxiety symptoms, and behaviors that look like ADHD are sometimes anxiety or something else entirely. The comorbidity screens tell the clinician where else to look.
References
- Wolraich, M. L., Lambert, W., Doffing, M. A., Bickman, L., Simmons, T., & Worley, K. (2003). Psychometric properties of the Vanderbilt ADHD Diagnostic Parent Rating Scale in a referred population. Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 28(8), 559-568. Official source
NICHQ Vanderbilt Assessment Scales, American Academy of Pediatrics and the National Initiative for Children’s Healthcare Quality.
Keep reading
A screener starts the conversation. Care is the next step.
Therapy, medication support, and testing for kids, teens, and parents. Online and covered by most major insurance plans.