The ongoing ADHD medicine shortage has been hurting UCA students’ grades and performance, they say.

According to NBC News, the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists said supply problems have affected 141 different formulations of ADHD medicines.

However, the Drug Enforcement Administration, which regulates the types of amphetamines used to make the pills, said pharmaceutical companies have more than enough raw ingredients to produce the medicine.

Harley Walls, a sophomore business management major with a minor in African and African-American studies, was diagnosed with ADHD in October 2022.

Walls said she usually gets her Adderall RX prescription from Walmart Pharmacy in Beebe but they are out; she tried to switch to Walmart on Dave Ward, but it also didn’t have her medicine.

“I was on again and off again for a little bit, but now I’ve been off for three weeks,” Walls said. “Walmart Pharmacy says they’ve been trying to order it, but it’s on backorder and they can’t access it.”

Walls said the shortage has negatively affected her all semester.

“I haven’t been able to focus and be in the present with my friends and family because I feel like my brain is scattered,” she said. “I also forget to turn in homework assignments when they are due so it’s decreased my grade drastically. I feel like I can’t function normally and have little to no motivation to do my homework when I do remember I have it.”

Walls said Adderall gives her “motivation to want to do everyday tasks.”

“ADHD causes executive dysfunction, which makes me not want to do the simplest tasks such as showering or doing homework,” she said. “ … [Adderall] also helps me focus by calming my brain so I’m not thinking of everything I have to do at one time. It lets me concentrate on one or two things at a time instead of 50.”

Walls hasn’t talked to her professors about the shortage’s impact on her grades.

“A lot of them have a no-excuse policy for late work, so I feel like if I asked for an extra day or hour to do my work they would get annoyed and not give it to me, or tell me that the syllabus has been posted since the beginning of the year,” she said. 

To stay motivated, Walls has been doing study sessions with her friends and Student Success Coaching, and she plans on getting tutoring for one of her more challenging classes. 

“There should be fewer restrictions on pharmacists and pharmacies,” Walls said, “There shouldn’t be a quota of amount of meds to be made at max.”

Caitlin Lawrence, a junior majoring in English education, takes Focalin XR for her ADHD, which she was diagnosed with in August of this year.

She said the medicine shortage has not impacted her and she picks up her prescription from CVS Pharmacy on Oak Street.

“I picked my medicine up at the beginning of the month and literally the day after my friend was telling me she couldn’t pick it up because it wasn’t available,” she said.

She said Focalin makes her feel “like a switch has flipped.”

“I can start tasks successfully and complete them, too,” she said. 

Lawrence said, “[ADHD] has absolutely affected my life because it is very hard for me to get tasks done — which taking medicine has made that easier for me now.”

“I wish [a shortage] was more predictable in the sense that people who rely and depend on it would know so that they could prepare or make arrangements to adjust,” she said.

Hannah McLellan, a junior middle level education major, said her fiance, who takes Focalin XR, takes two pills a day.

“He is physically unable to go without his ADHD medicine … We have gone as far as Pine Bluff just to get a full prescription of his meds,” she said. “We have used Walmart, Kroger, multiple family-owned pharmacies because we keep having to change to whoever has the prescription in stock. It’s the world’s worst game of telephone.”

Ana Brandon, a freshman double majoring in broadcast journalism and theatre, said the shortage has affected her for about a year now.

Brandon takes Vyvanse from CVS Pharmacy on Oak Street and said the staff told her there’s a shortage.

“I have less focus in class, and I forget things on my schedule,” she said. “ … [Vyvanse] is a stimulant to my brain. So it’s enough to where I can focus in class and not shout or be hyper in class. 

“When I’m off my meds I say spontaneous things and won’t stop moving, so when I do take them I strictly focus on my assignment,” Brandon said.

Brandon said she has not talked to her professors about the shortage’s impact on her.

“They just say follow the OARS instructions,” she said. “I feel like they genuinely don’t care because there are ways you can do something about it.”

Brandon said, “I think teachers and professors should be aware that there is a shortage which means behavior in the classroom can change. I know in high school, administrators noticed the behavioral changes increased when medication was less accessible due to the shortage.”