How do you get a diagnosis?
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How do you get a diagnosis?
| Wed, 04-30-2008 - 12:50pm |
Hello ladies. We apparently don't have developmental peds on our insurance, so I was wondering if there was anyone else who could give us a diagnosis for Gray. We made an appointment for a DAN doctor...first appointment was in NOVEMBER! And it is 300 bucks a session, but we can't NOT try, ya know? I would really like to know exactly what we are dealing with here though. Any suggestions? Any other practitioners that can diagnose ASD?
















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Dear Lucinda,
Our son's dx was given him by a neuropsychologist who specializes in diagnosing and works particularly with children on the autistic spectrum. I would look into neuropsychs or psychologists on your plan and see if they have a specialization in diagnosing children on the spectrum.
yours,
Sara
Hi Lucinda,
Since your in Maryland, can you go here?
http://www.kennedykrieger.org/kki_2nd_inside.jsp?pid=1
This hospital is one of the leaders regarding children with Neuro problems.
Visit my blog
If you're in Maryland, you can also try Children's Hospital in Rockville. That's where my kids got their dx. They met with a team of doctors in the neuropsych dept. Originally we were on the wait list at Kennedy Krieger, but then our insurance changed and wouldn't cover KK (we were on the wait list for nine months). I think Kennedy Krieger would have been awesome, but I was very, very happy with Children's and how thorough they were. Our wait for an appt was about 3-4 months at Children's.
Lucinda, I know I briefly gave you info in an email but I highly recommend going to NIH.
Mollie
Well I had Liam see a neuropsychologist AND a developmental Ped at Kennedy Krieger and all we got was the ADHD dx and a lot of "hmmmm, wel he seems adhd, but there are these other issues....."
I do think the neuropsychologist was old school and Liam was on his best behaviour (kwim-no flapping, decent eye contact). The dev ped was VERY young and I suspect followed the recommendation of the older neuropsych (he had referred us to her for a 2nd opinion). What we did get from KK was a through learning and IQ evaluation and a referral to a social skills group at the KKI. We were lucky as I called on a Tuesday and they had a cancellation for the Monday. In fact the intake specialist on teh phone recommended the neuropsych as that dept had a shorter waiting list. We saw him in February '05 and the dev ped the following May.
It was here in GA that we received the ASD dx and it was from the school psychologist; although she is the psychologist in charge of phd interns and basically one of the head honchos too. She also used to work with EI. Cian received his dx from a clinical psychologist that took our insurance, and his own ds has autism too. I believe the key is for the psychologist to have a phd, for various agencies to accept the findings.
Look on your insurance website for clinical psychologists with phd's and who deal with kids. In teh end Liam's dx cost us nothing and Cian's a $50 co-pay. We were lucky that Kennedy Krieger took Aetna HMO in 2005, although in hindsight they really did us no big favours. I think as they are the foremost in the area of ASD's and get so many affected kids the hf kiddos can get sidelined.
Dee
We didn't have to pay for our Dx testing at all. The school district did all the diagnostic testing then the state dept of special needs/autism division sent out a psychologist to do evaluations of Weston and interviews of teachers and both parents. We have since seen the developmental ped (which we had to pay most of and the Dr doesn't accept or file insurance).
Betsy
Our Insurance doesn't cover Dev Ped's either, but I learned that because of this, with a referral from my Ped, I could write my Insurance Company and move that the visit be approved....because basically Insurance wasn't convering a necessary visit.
I wrote it and they did.
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