ADHD, neurodevelopment and child and adolescent mental health

Omolola is a consultant psychiatrist working across child and adolescent psychiatry, general adult psychiatry and community mental health. She holds a Master’s in Child and Adolescent Mental Health from University College London and has more than five years of CAMHS experience in Australia.

ADHD is rarely the only thing present. Anxiety, depression, trauma, 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, and where ADHD is not the right answer the patient and their family are told so clearly, with an explanation of what comes next.

Her clinical interests are child and adolescent mental health, women’s mental health, consultation–liaison psychiatry and cultural psychiatry. She works from trauma-informed principles and pays close attention to cultural context, on the view that a person’s circumstances, history and strengths shape what recovery looks like for them.

How she works

Omolola’s approach is collaborative. She takes the position that effective treatment is built on shared understanding and partnership, working with patients, their families and multidisciplinary teams to develop evidence-based care plans, and integrating biological, psychological and social perspectives rather than treating any one of them as the whole answer.

She also brings a carer’s lived experience to her consultations, alongside her clinical training.

Background and training

Omolola obtained her Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery in 2007 and her Fellowship of the West African College of Physicians in Psychiatry in 2015. She completed her MSc in Child and Adolescent Mental Health at University College London as a Commonwealth Scholar, and is a Fellow of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists.

She has worked across acute inpatient units, community teams and consultation–liaison services in Australia and overseas, assessing and managing mood and anxiety disorders, psychosis, trauma-related disorders and neurodevelopmental conditions.