Tell me how a neuropsychologist evaluation will help my son

[Renea]

My son is 10 years old. He has an Asperger's diagnosis and General Anxiety Disorder that was given by a pediatric neurologist and a psychiatrist. He was given that diagnosis two years ago. We have had other doctors (therapists and other psychiatrists) say different diagnosis such as Adhd, bipolar, and odd. I finally decided to beg for the neuropsychologist evaluation for my son after reading about it and being told to have it done on here. I took him in for his yearly check-up with his pediatrician and explained the situation and why I wanted a neuropsychologist evaluation. We had only seen that pediatrician one other time. We are a military family and we have lived here for about a year so we don't have a long history with this pediatrician. When I told her that I want a neuropsychologist evaluation, she kinda looked at me like I had three heads. She first offered to put in a referral for another therapist instead of neuropsychologist and when I explained to her that we have seen countless therapists, psychiatric doctors, a pediatric neurologist and a developmental pediatrician, all with different answers for my sons problems, she decided to go ahead and put in the referral so we could find out what's really going on. She told me there would be a 3-6 month wait. She told me I could call the referral department periodically and check on the status of the referral.

That was almost a month ago. A couple of days ago I decided to call the referral department and see where we are on the list and they told me that the pediatricians office didn't fill out the paperwork correctly and it was sent back to the pediatrician on the same day that they received it. The problem was that they didn't fill out any "symptoms or diagnosis" in regards to why the evaluation was needed so the referral department sent it back. So I call the pediatrician office and they call me back today and ask me, again, "why are you wanting this type of evaluation done"? The whole thing is making me feel like they have never put in for something like this for a child before. And now we are back on the bottom of the list to boot. SO... if you read all that, Thank You!!

My question is, what happens once the neuropsychologist evaluation is completed? Will it test for every kind of mental health problem? I'm just needing some reassurance that I'm doing the right thing!!

 

[InsaneCdn]

How much do you trust the Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)/Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) diagnosis? If you feel that diagnosis "fits" with what you live with, then there may not be much advantage to another evaluation.

On the other hand... even if Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)/Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) "fits" but it doesn't explain everything you are dealing with, OR if Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)/Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) doesn't fit, OR if the previous dxes didn't come with a solid list of recommendations for moving forward (if appropriate, things like Occupational Therapist (OT) therapy, accommodations and/or interventions at school, Auditory Processing Disorders (APD) screening, etc.)... then a new comprehensive evaluation would be warranted.

How long since the last evaluation? If it's 3 years or more, I'd definitely be seeking a re-evaluation... kids change!

 

[Renea]

His Asperger's diagnosis seemed to really fit him when he was younger but now I feel there is more going on. His violent outburst are scary and he's getting bigger and older, so getting the proper diagnosis so important right now. I guess I'm just wondering why it's so much better to have a neuropsychologist evaluation than to have them evaluated from a psychiatrist or some other professional. I see neuropsychologist recommended on here a lot and I'm so very happy that the referral is going through, but we will be waiting several more months before we can get in to have this done and I'm just hoping that it is worth it. He really needs a change in medications. I think that would help him tremendously. But I don't want to mess with his medications until after he has this testing done.

 

[InsaneCdn]

neuropsychologist isn't the ONLY option.
What you need is a comprehensive evaluation.
And most comprehensive evaluations - no matter who is doing it or if it's a team - will have a wait-list.

Sounds to me like you have a valid reason for re-evaluation: ".... but now I feel there is more going on...".

 

[BusynMember]

Actually, in the US it's the best option. That's where I'd go if it were my child. A comprehensive evaluation done by a bunch of professionals is usually done when the child is very, very young. But that's my opinion. That's what I'd do.

I have heard that the military is more difficult. Good luck!

 

[TeDo]

We also saw many, many "professionals" that had answers that gave difficult child 1 a LONG list of diagnosis's over the years. The neuropsychologist looked at ALL the records from every one of those others and did testing of his own and came up with the REAL answer. His Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and ADHD diagnosis covered pretty much every symptom difficult child 1 ever displayed. Everything made so much sense after that and changes were made with those 2 in mind and we've come a long way. The tx for these diagnosis's are all so different that if you have the wrong diagnosis, you have the wrong tx and nothing gets better and may even get worse.

We had to wait 6 months from the first request so don't give up. It was well worth the wait and made a huge difference. The key for us was to make sure the neuropsychologist had everything I could gather from all years past. That is what I spent that waiting time doing. I even got reports from way back when he was a baby. The more info they have, the more accurate their diagnosis. Good luck.

 

[Renea]

Good to know TeDo! I'll start gathering things up.

 

[InsaneCdn]

A comprehensive evaluation done by a bunch of professionals is usually done when the child is very, very young.

This is not true. SOME evaluation teams are specialized toward younger kids, but so are some individual specialists. Any form of comprehensive evaluation is available, no matter what the age of the child. (I haven't heard of team evaluations for adults, but that doesn't mean it isn't out there somewhere...)
We don't have access to neuropsychologists. We've had fairly good results from team evaluations, and from PhD-level psychologists with a specialty in testing.