ADHD assessment and treatment

Payal is a consultant psychiatrist with more than a decade of experience across adult, child and adolescent mental health, and neurodevelopmental conditions are the first of her stated clinical interests. She assesses and treats ADHD by telehealth.

ADHD is rarely the only thing present. Anxiety, depression, autism, sleep disturbance and, in adults, substance use either sit alongside it or account for the symptoms outright, and separating them is the substance of the assessment. At Pandion these are screened as standard rather than treated as an optional extra. Where ADHD is not the right answer, that is said clearly, along with what the assessment did find.

Having worked across both child and adult services is directly useful for a condition that does not stop at eighteen. She can assess a child whose difficulties are only now becoming visible at school, and she can assess an adult whose difficulties began in a childhood nobody examined at the time.

ADHD, autism and women’s mental health

Women’s mental health is one of Payal’s stated clinical interests, and it sits alongside her interest in neurodevelopmental conditions rather than separately from it. ADHD and autism in women and girls have historically been recognised later than in men and boys, and often after years of being understood as anxiety, depression or a difficulty with coping.

The presentation is frequently quieter: inattention rather than visible hyperactivity, effort spent on masking, and difficulties that surface at points of change such as adolescence, becoming a parent, or the perimenopausal years. A psychiatrist who works across both neurodevelopmental conditions and women’s mental health is well placed to recognise that pattern rather than stop at the diagnosis that arrived first.

How she works

Payal’s approach is warm, collaborative and patient-centred. She focuses on building a strong working relationship and develops practical, evidence-based treatment plans with each person rather than for them.

Background and training

Payal holds an MBBS, an MD in Psychiatry, and Fellowship of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (FRANZCP).

After several years practising as a consultant psychiatrist overseas, she moved to Australia, completed specialist training here, and has worked across a range of public mental health services in the Northern Territory. That is experience in one of the most geographically dispersed health systems in the country, where distance rather than availability is often what stands between a person and a specialist, which is much of the reason telehealth matters.

Outside the clinic

Payal spends time with her family, travels and explores new places, and stays active. She values balance, curiosity and lifelong learning, and brings a calm, down-to-earth style to her clinical practice.