Does anyone get an ADHD assessment and not get diagnosed

[LemonViolet]

Has anyone been though an ADHD assessment thinking that they have ADHD and been told they no they don’t?

Thanks @HMG107 , this is all encouraging me to make the steps

@Nefelibata86

Sorry if this is taking over the original post. Happy to start a new thread if so. I understand there is a crossover of diagnoses. If paying for a private adhd assessment would their remit be to say yes or no to the adhd alone or can they generally say if not adhd then it’s autism or ocd for instance? Or would that require a whole new assessment

I had my assessment privately, recently, and I was assessed for (and was diagnosed with) both because that's what I asked for. You'd need to say beforehand because they get you to fill out separate forms for ASD and ADHD.

It's unlikely they'd diagnose ASD off the back of an ADHD assessment without 'looking' for and into the ASD too, if that makes sense.

It varies by area but where I am on the NHS adult services for ADHD and ASD are separate.

There are people in my other ADHD groups who were told they did not have ADHD following assessment. Both private and NHS.

@TooManyPJs

There are people in my other ADHD groups who were told they did not have ADHD following assessment. Both private and NHS.

@TooManyPJs sorry coming back to this as I lost the thread.

But these people still believe they have ADHD (participating in ADHD groups) after a negative private assessment?

Hi OP
Yep! Was told by NHS psychiatrist that I definitely didn't have it (they also told me they basically didn't really believe in ADHD in adult women who has got through university/had a job/were in a relationship ). Eventually I got money together for a private assessment and the diagnosis was yes definitely ADHD, and he couldn't imagine how the original NHS psych had missed this.
I think the NHS psychiatrist, who worked in a general setting, knew very little about ADHD and thought I was a time waster who had strong-armed them into an assessment.

The private psychiatrist (who had lots of experience with ASD and ADHD, both in the NHS and privately) was able to give me a longer assessment - 2 hours - and actually listened and asked relevant questions.

The first assessment was all about "were you physically disruptive at school", even though I already knew that this isn't necessarily how girls present.

So...I didn't buy myself the diagnosis I wanted, but I did have to buy a suitable assessment, unfortunately. There are obviously lots of NHS assessments that are more thorough than the one I had, but I was unlucky with local provision.

Yes my daughter her old school flagged it and we jumped through hoops teachers documentations QB tests online interviews for two hours with an ADHD nurse her new school teacher and SENCO lead both agreed gave massive amounts of evidence to support this

the hospital then deemed her as not having adhd as she scored in the normal range for the QB test ( comments said she focused on the task) and that as her school work wasn’t suffering they didn’t think she had adhd

beyond exhausted trying to sort this for her having to back to square on this again!

A colleague of mine went for an assessment through her university. She was convinced she had ADHD as her son was diagnosed. But they did assess her has having learning difficulties requiring extra time but not ADHD.

Yes, me. The psychiatrist said "well you probably do think a bit differently but it's not causing you any problems so I'm not going to give you a diagnosis".

Pretty pissed off to be honest - I mean if it wasn't causing any problems I'd not have been there in the first place would I?

Pretty much everything I read from ADHD people describing themselves rings very true to me. But I'm not sure where I can go from here. It was back around 2022 or so, been trying on and off to get the written report from the psychiatrist but of course what happens is I email, then don't follow up and have to start again months later.

Actually that has just occured to me, one of the reasons I fail to get things done is that email/messaging has made communication asynchronous. So in the past you'd speak on the phone, they'd ask, you'd answer and things would move. Now I email, I see a reply but I'm busy, I don't read the reply or I read it at 2am and can't act on it, it gets buried under everything else....