AIBU to worry about the surge in school-suggested ASD diagnoses?

[cremebrulait]

Fellow mums, I'm worried about a trend I've noticed in our schools. It seems some are pushing parents to seek ASD diagnoses to secure funding for support. While I absolutely believe children with autism deserve all the help they can get, I'm concerned about the following:

1. The high rate of suggested ASD diagnoses in some classes (much higher than average)
2. Schools advising parents to get diagnoses to continue enrollment
3. Long NHS waiting times leading to private evaluations

I worry this might lead to:

• Misallocation of resources
• Inappropriate interventions for children
• Overlooking other potential issues
• Psychological impact on misdiagnosed children

Shouldn't there be equality in support for children with other learning or developmental issues too? Like ADHD, emotional and behavioural disorders, sensory impairments, physical disabilities, intellectual disabilities, developmental delays, health conditions, sensory processing disorder, specific learning differences, or twice-exceptional children?

AIBU to think this system is flawed? Has anyone else experienced this? Am I overreacting, or is this a genuine concern? What are your thoughts on how we can ensure all children get the right support without resorting to potentially inaccurate diagnoses?

(I'll post more thoughts on misdiagnosis in comments.)

The differences in maturity between the oldest and youngest in a class are less apparent as they progress through the school and negligible ultimately, on the whole.

Sensory impairments, ADHD, BED can all be associated with ASD and are part of diagnoses.

Which schools are advising a diagnosis in order to continue to have a place at the school? Parents are much more likely now, to pursue a diagnosis, to reach an understanding of strategies that best suit their child’s needs and enable the school to work effectively with those children.

Because budgets have been decimated there are little or no specialist services allocated to schools, so parents have sought EP, SaLT and other specialist advice privately

Unless a child has an EHCP, there is no specific funding for a diagnosis. Funding is on the basis of need, not diagnosis.

I wonder if anyone who actually has a child with ASD has voted YANBU. Usually these threads are filled with people with no knowledge or experience spouting their opinions as "fact".

And even then bet you didn’t automatically get any support, if it’s anything like where I live it’s diagnose and discharge with a few leaflets

Schools don't get extra money as soon as a child is diagnosed with ASD. Additional funding is for additional support in school and millions of kids with ASD don't need anything extra. My son has ASD (it's looking likely that I do too) and he is a high achiever with no needs in school at all, aside from maybe the teacher understanding that he isn't a fan of germs - why would the school deserve more money for that?!

Also, getting diagnosed involves two separate medical professionals assessing the child and then agreeing on a diagnosis. They don't give out diagnoses as a favour to help out school funding!

The reason for the increase in numbers is likely to be awareness of signs of autism in school staff and at home (so more seeking assessment) and a better recognition of symptoms from medical professionals. Lets not forget, it's only in very recent years that women and girls (who often present very differently to males) have even been considered for assessment unless they were profoundly autistic.

How you can see a better understanding of a condition as a negative is literally beyond me, although your 'understanding' of it does seem more than a tad ignorant.

For those who are stuck in long waiting lists for assessments don’t feel you need to wait for a diagnosis to push for support. schools should support based on needs and you don’t need a diagnosis in order to obtain an EHCP.

In my experience, the school SENCO would tell me that the school do get a little bit of extra funding and that the school can provide for her needs with that - but this was only said every time I said I wanted to apply for an EHCP. Whenever I left them to carry out that plan, I would later discover that they had not been doing anythng to support her and the conversation would start again. It was my impression that the school did not want me to apply for an EHCP because they would have to fund part of it because the pittance they did receive did not cover it.

My DD was diagnosed after going non-verbal at a new primary school - the diagnosis process was not encouraged by the school but rather supported by a GP and a new paediatrician who was willing to refer her to a specialist centre in London as they could not assess her while she had selective mutism. I had to research this myself and ask the paediatrician to do it.

The parent is so often on their own in all of this and so often the clock is run down. The schools are put in an impossible position of your child versus many other children.

This.

There’s posting a goady thread and there’s spreading actual misinformation. This thread should be reported as its firmly the latter.

Grow up OP.

Your right but a diagnosis does help. In my area they always reject the first application and an ECHP is really hard to get

CAHMs adviced we apply for one now as they get rejected so often hopefully she will be accepted by the time she reaches secondary school is what they said

This is an absolute pile of bilge posted by someone who doesn't have a fkin scooby.

I have also seen this in one of our local schools, OP. Though not to receive funding or resources, but to excuse a poor handle of behaviour, lack of support from upper management and poor class dynamics. I received an awful lot of pressure concerning our son, as did other parents in the class concerning their children. I had the benefit of having has my son in another school previous to this in which he experienced zero issues. I moved schools again to one I had more confidence in and he is now doing wonderfully again. It was the school.

Ok @cremebrulait I'll bite.
My ds has a dual diagnosis of ADHD and ASD amongst other issues. He was diagnosed in primary 1 with ADHD and the end of p2 beginning of p3 with ASD.

1st, he's the oldest in his year having missed the cut off date by 1 day
2nd, ABA is harmful to all children and is abusive towards anyone with ASD! On this I speak as a autistic victim of ABA when I was a child
3rd, a diagnosis of ASD is extremely difficult and private diagnosis are rarely accepted.
4th, having a diagnosis on its own gets you no extra support or money you must have additional needs above average levels.
5th, no child is medicated for ASD so your claim about your friends child doesn't hold water.
6th a child who has been assessed as needing a 1 to 1 has been assessed by educational psychologists and other educational experts and funding from local government and Westminster to specifically pay for said 1to1 support for that child not the rest of the class
7th, ASD is a spectrum so each person's abilities should be assessed and then the course work should be set at their level and reassessed periodically to make sure their educational needs are being met.

I really do hope that you are lying about working with children with ASD as your ignorance shines through your posts and your offensive opinions belong in the bin. Fucking ABA was discredited years ago as child abuse

IME, they say they will do that to stop you applying for an EHCP, but in reality they can't because they don't have the resources or enough funding. EHCP forces the school and local authority to provide support that they don't have the money for.

The NHS stopped being able to send speech therapists to the school, concentrating on giving group training to parents and TA's. My DD's school had no TA to send, because the few that remained were covering for teachers. So I was trained by the speech therapists in the big group, took a long sabbatical from work from which my career never really recovered from, and went into the school to do the therapy myself. So many parents are not going to be able to afford to do that, we barely could.

Sick to death of these stupid posts.
Can’t even be bothered to explain how hard it is to get a diagnosis, how long you have to wait and how little support there is.

I mean, a diagnosis doesn't equate to funding

And a diagnosis isn't actually easy to get. There are lots of things involved.

Is this impacting you? If not, why the need to post about it?

As a parent to a DS with ASD all I can say is you are talking BOLLOCKS!

How terrifying . U ok hun? Hugs

I work in a school. We all say that the wait list for diagnosis is so long that we'd never wait for it before doing something. We treat need not diagnosis. Even with clear signs of need, we don't always get funding!

Unfortunately a diagnosis doesn't even guarantee parental support far less funding!

Out of the hundreds of children I've seen who have a diagnosis, I've only ever questioned one. I've seen plenty of masking and children who 'look fine' in school. Doesn't mean they are!

Interesting about a pp who mentioned change in education from Gove. Hadn't really thought about it but I would agree. It's not like there are suddenly more children with ASC but there are certainly more who aren't coping and need more adaptations in a system which is contradictory. (Inclusion and adaptation for all but also everyone learns the same thing, at the same pace and schools are penalised if they aren't doing both.)

Do you not think that those of us who work on autism pathways (over 20 years in my case) have even the slightest inkling of what we are doing?

Also, where are you living that offers ABA as a standard intervention?

Honestly I am getting a bit peeved with this kind of post on here recently.

Autism assessors know about attachment and trauma. We don't give diagnoses "in order to get school support". Most autism pathways are health based and independent of education. We aren't diagnosing someone with a lifelong neurodevelopmental condition lightly or without due diligence you know.

Interesting the op hasn’t come back. 🤔

Slight tangent but very young children use terminology that they copy from adults, 'it's my anxiety ', 'my mum says I must be adhd/autistic' after some perfectly normal behaviour. Those and many more from the mouths of nursery children

What has that allegation got to do with anything?

"I keep hearing about 1 to 1 support - but the children they support don’t need 1 to 1 help all the time! Isn’t that a wasted resource other parents could benefit from?"

A wasted resource that other parents could benefit from?

It isn't parents who benefit from the 1-2-1, they don't support your child all day and give you a neatly folded basket of laundry and a casserole at home time.

Also, support in school isn't based on a diagnosis. It's based on the challenges that a child faces. All of this has to be evidenced for the best part of a year with interventions / outcomes all assessed in school and by external bodies.

No teacher is wanting the extra paperwork, meetings and mental load that supporting a child towards diagnosis or EHCP takes.

What funding? I'm not aware of extra funding for children with ASD. Any child with additional needs may qualify for an ehcp which has extra funding but they're like hens' teeth according to my son's school. Like any other child and ASD child would have to have significant support needs.