5 year old on the spectrum, where should Mom begin?

intparent
Wed, 13 Apr 2011 15:55:45 +0000

The OP did not mention medication. I believe MiamiDAP is the one who turned the conversation that way.

Our evaluation (as mentioned before, done by the pediatric mental health outpatient unit of a local hospital) included input from the school and both parents, along with their own testing and observation (about 1.5 days of various testing with D). This seemed like a pretty through process to me, and looking back several years later, their results seem pretty close to correct. A school evaluation would not be nearly as thorough, and the schools sometimes have some incentive toward (or away) from specific diagnosis. Honestly, in many school districts, I also think they are not usually as qualified to evaluate the full spectrum of possibilities as the type of team that evaluated D.