Multi Disaplinary Assesment for ASD, what to expect?

[roadkillbunny]

Ds (5.5 years old) has his Multi Disaplinary Assesment week after next and I was hoping somebody could tell me a little more about what to expect.

It is a completely hospital based Assesment and takes place over the cause of a week. The timetable looks like this:
Monday he sees an occupational therapist
Tuesday he has Audiology then his paediatrician (community) then he sees a SALT
Wednesday is a psychologist
Thursday is orthoptist, dentist and finally an Ophthalmologist.
Friday is the case conference/discussion time and ds does not attend on that day.

Apart from the community paediatrician these are all new people we have never had any contact with before.
On the Friday for the big conference the head and ds's reception teacher (who had him last year) have agreed to come along, sadly the SENCO can't make it but the head and reception teacher know ds so very well and have been amazing so I am really glad they are coming, at least there will be familiar friendly faces there for dh and I! It made since for the reception teacher to go as his current Y1 teacher will have had him for the grand total of 9 school days by then!

Can anybody tell me what to expect from all this? Ds is currently 'diagnosed' as having sensory processing disorder and a speech and language disorder. The paediatrician feels that it is most likely that ds has an ASD, maybe Aspergers, he is high functioning in allot of ways but has a very significant speech problem. His understanding of language is age appropriate however his general speech is that of a 3.5 year old and his expressive speech of a 2.5 - 3 year old. This is actually a massive improvement as in January he was assessed as having the speech of a 22 month old and his expressive language was too low to really measure. He has has quite extensive work with speech support worker who came into achool and school really extended that workas we did at home. Ds has done really well.

Any thought, expirences or advice would be so greatly appreciated. Thank you for reading!

Blimey, that is A LOT of professionals in a MDA. Our sons went through about 6 months to a year of observation between the paediatrician with written discussions from school and us. She later referred our son to the main ASD team who consisted of the ASD Paediatrician, Psychologist and SALT plus the local charity support member.

We sat in a room and discussed the issues concerning our son and then made an appointment the following week to have some tests with the Psychologist that consisted of visual and verbal tests. They then wrote a report which we received in the post. We were referred to the OT for sensory issues but this had a three year waiting list so we went private. SALT were also supposed to do tests but nothing happened until about a year and a half later.

From the initial viewing with the team and from the Psych's report they were able to offer the diagnosis of High Functioning Autism.

Within the year we had received a report from the private OT confirming significant sensory issues that were already known to the Paediatrician - it just confirmed it on paper. SALT weren't really able to offer anything for us as its mainly the intonation of our sons speech which they say they can't really change.

We have 6-12 month check-ups and did eventually see the NHS OT who did a few extra checks but basically confirmed what we already had or knew. SALT eventually did some tests which confirmed verbally processing issues which again isn't something they can fix - or so they say and we don't have the fund for anymore private help.

Once you have the diagnosis, they might monitor and see you occasionally for a quick 5 minute update or they might refer you back tot he GP to monitor.

That's our experience, but it does depend on the area you live in and the extent of the issues.

Our MTA was quite similar - all done over one week - Monday with an OT; Wednesday with SALT and an Ed psych. We'd seen the paed the week before and he was also assessed by portage. There was a big team meeting on the Friday where everybody gave their reports and we were given a dx of ASD on the day. The MTA is a good thing and gives you lots of reports which helps for DLA or statementing.

Our OT looked at gross and fine motor skills through play whilst another OT discussed the situation with the parent. OT also looked at games using language and sharing. The SALT and Ed pysch observed him playing and tried to engage him by encouraging him to talk and interact socially.

Since then we have attended an intensive interaction group (4 group sessions for DS) and 2 sessions for parents. These were filmed and we got to observe the changes in behaviour of our DS and the other children in the group. We have an appointment next week to start our son's individual care package. We're also attending a sensory group and will have intervention from the sleep team Our CDC has a program developed by two of its professionals which has a wonderful approach. We're pleased with the service we are receiving - it's just a shame it took so long to get there.