UK study examines how menstrual cycles affect ADHD symptoms

Fifty women with ADHD who take medication will record how their menstrual cycle affects their symptoms and daily life for 3 months using daily smartphone questionnaires and a smart-ring wearable that records sleep, activity and body temperature.

Researchers at Queen Mary University of London and King’s College London have launched the Measuring Adult ADHD and Menstruation Study. Led by Queen Mary’s Jessica Agnew-Blais, the project will test whether menstrual cycles change ADHD symptoms in women taking medication.

Adult women with ADHD have been overlooked in research, even though women make up nearly half of the adult ADHD population. Many women report that their symptoms worsen, or that medication works less well, at certain points in the cycle, but that pattern has not been tested in a dedicated study before now.

Their reports will feed into questions including whether clinicians should consider cycle-based monitoring or medication adjustments during certain phases of the month.

Layla Kornota, a 30-year-old teaching assistant diagnosed with ADHD as a child, says her routines usually keep her on track until her period approaches, when, as she puts it, “control evaporates.” Héloïse, 19, says Ritalin can give her a three-hour window of focus, but during her period she “waits and waits” for a reaction that never comes.

Roughly 2.5 million people in the UK have ADHD, and hundreds of thousands are waiting for an NHS diagnosis. NHS figures from December last year showed a 23% rise in stimulant and ADHD-drug prescriptions compared with the year before, while a government taskforce report in November last year found ADHD was still being under-diagnosed and under-treated.

In June 2025, Queen Mary University of London found that women with a clinical ADHD diagnosis were more than three times as likely to meet criteria for premenstrual dysphoric disorder, or PMDD, than women without ADHD. Women with high ADHD symptoms and impairment were more than four times as likely to have PMDD. A 2026 review in the Journal of Clinical Medicine examined 29 studies published between 2015 and 2025 and found that hormonal shifts across the menstrual cycle can worsen attention, executive function, impulsivity, mood and medication response, especially in the luteal and pre-menstrual phases.