Social communication disorder

[sleepyhorse]

On ds1's latest report from the pediatrician, follwing her visit at his nursery where she observed him, she has highlighted the main issues as "Language and speech delay and possible social communication disorder".Bit confused what she means by the latter - is it another term for ASD?

A speech and language delay can be part of a wider developmental issue which may resolve in various ways until the age of maturation 7 - 8 years of age. This could be just a communication disability such as auditory processing disorder (APD) or APD co-morbid with say ADHD or other complex issues which could be a social communication disorder.
APD is a communication disorder, and is detrimental to sound based social communication, but there are various forms of communication so it may depend on which communication processes your DS has problems processing, and whether he may grow out of them as part of his natural development until the age of maturation. Which ma\y be difficult to predict until the age of 6-7.

when my son had a SALT assessment her report said my son had significant social communication difficulties. He was diagnosed with Aspergers 2 months later, so yes i think it must mean ASD

did some googling this afternoon following your other thread - I also find the "social communication disorder" thingy intriguing as it comes up in DD's reports very frequently.

As far as I understood now: ASD is a social communication disorder but not every social communication disorder is ASD. SCD is a broader term than ASD. ASD refers to the triad of impairments. however, if the repetitive and restrictive behaviors are not present, it is not ASD but a SCD. so SCD seem to be more of a duo of impairments

the more I read about it, the more I wonder if DD has a SCD rather than ASD....

Ah ha. Last week we were told DS1 has 'traits of autism' as he has social and communication difficulties (with both receptive and expressive language delay, though SLT has helped him progress greatly) but no behavioural difficulties. I have been doing exactly the same as chocjunkie and googling away. My conclusion being we have a SCD too, though I keep wondering whether the paed and SLT are building up to an ASD diagnosis... But then having read about the new diagnostic criteria (DSM-IV) I realise we don't meet them as we don't have behavioural issues. Many say 'you need a diagnosis of ASD to get support', so this leaves me pondering if an official diagnosis of SCD gets the same support as one of ASD?

dolfrog you have always posted on threads I've started or joined and been such a huge help. Would you be able to answer one more question. Can APD lead to social recipocity difficulties such as little two way conversation. Our DS has good eye contact, imaginative play etc... but two way conversation is limited and he's very anti-social with people till he's got to know them.

Just found this which might be useful to people
www.dsm5.org/proposedrevision/pages/proposedrevision.aspx?rid=489

cjn27b

APD is about having problems processing all sound based stimuli, or information. This covers all sounds, which includes speech the human based sound based communication system.

APD is like having a loose wire in your stereo system, and you have to best guess the to fill in the bits you miss to make sense of the communication.
To fill in the sound information gaps we need to develop alternative compensating skills and abilities to help us best guess the gaps or missing bits of sound, or missing bits of a conversation, or the missing bits of verbal instructions, or missing bits of a lecture etc.
Nearly all who have APD lipread to try to compensate, which requires learning how each sound source physically moves when producing a particular sound or word or phrase. Specifically the mouth movements, and and facial areas around the mouth. We also like to read body language to help fill in the information processing gaps.
Both of these coping strategies are visual, and requires an understanding of very subtle mouth movements used by the person speaking, which varies from person to person, and also to have an understanding of each persons body language, which again subtly varies from person to person. So we have to get to know a person quite well before we may feel confident enough to engage in conversation. So that we feel able to process, or best guess what they might be saying.

There is a great deal more as this can be quite a complex issue, but i hope this helps

What choc said plus our experience may be helpful...

DS has a social communication disorder or delay (but he ain't catching up so I think it's fair to say we're dropping the delay) but he is not on the autistic spectrum.

When children go through ADOS, they are observed and scored for various 'markers'. If they score sufficiently high enough on enough of these markers it is an ASD dx. If they don't, but score higher than an NT child would, that's where you start to hear HCPS talking about 'autistic traits' - i.e. they aren't NT, there are areas of concern, but they aren't 'autistic enough' to get an ASD dx.

For DS, those areas of concern were all around the social/communication area, so that became his DX.

Now, I always read dolfrog's posts with interest because he is so specific about the various co-conditions that exist. In my healthcare area, there seemed to be no interest in getting a more specific dx. For example, if someone posts on here about APD or dyspraxia and I follow a link and think 'that sounds familiar', but no-one seemed to be interested in pushing for a more specific dx.

I often think about going back and pushing for another shot on the dx roundabout, but as DS is doing well at the moment and we are getting support I'm probably not going to. But I reserve the right to change my mind on that!

So. SCD is not ASD, SCD is a condition in its own right which does not mean you may go onto get an ASD dx. But there may be other conditions which SCD dx is, in effect, covering up. But for me, how specific I need to get with dxs is really about how much I need a specific dx to get support.

Sorry LONG!

Wonderful info and advice. Don't apologise for the length / depth. It's great to have people willing to share experience. Supportive and informative.

When I mentioned about support, I more meant that I don't think we'd get any more support for a more specific dx so seems no point in putting us and DS through more appts, stress, etc.