What does an autism pre-assessment entail?

[Rhubarblin]

My DD is awaiting an autism assessment which the paediatrician described is like a pre-screening for a full assessment. Does anyone know what happens during this / how long (the assessment rather than waiting times although that could be useful too)?

She's under the paediatrician for everything now and has GDD. We see physio for gross motor delays and awaiting SALT. I assume they would want her seen by SALT first. In July she was 3 years 3 months and her development was marked at 18 months - 36 months for various areas.

The paediatrician thinks that whilst she definitely fits some areas (eg meticulously organises toys) in other ways she doesn't meet the criteria at all for a diagnosis so I wonder if she may not be a top priority to be seen. They are describing her as 'GDD with autistic traits' at the moment.

The difficulty with answering your question is that things operate differently in different parts of the country.
So, for example where I work, this 'pre-assessment' doesn't happen. If the Paediatrician believes they have, or might have autism, they go on a ludicrously long waiting list for their assessment and then they have that assessment and diagnosis or not shortly after that. SaLT would be involved in the multi-disciplinary assessment.

I doubt the fact that she is more of a puzzle, rather than definitely having autism, would affect the length of the wait.

I think to get the detail you want, you'd probably need to say which authority you are under, which you might not want to do, of course.

Thanks for your response Kite. I've now had some paperwork through and she is on the 'social communication pathway' to confirm or not diagnosis. It's all worded like she actually won't have a specific assessment just for autism, rather input from SALT, nursery etc along with the fact she's already been seen by paeds 3 times and they have done the 'growing skills assessment'.

Having re read the paperwork the SCP is to see if she would meet the threshold for diagnosis but not actually diagnose her, so it's an information collecting exercise by the sounds of it. If she meets the threshold she would then be sent for an actual assessment I think.

Yes, where I am, the teachers , SaLTs, Nursery Nurses and sometimes OTs do all the assessments, including observations and conversations with Nurseries and parents, and then they meet with the Paediatrician who 'officially' gives the diagnosis.

That's really helpful Kite ...perhaps it's the same then...reports from all the different areas and then official diagnosis from the paediatrician.

We had these "pre-assessment" assessments about every 6 months between when DD first saw services (maybe age 2.5?) to when she was Dx'ed at 4. The final one was a kind of "gateway" to getting that ADOS etc. and the visit to nursery that formed part of the full assessment - but they were all pretty similar. Generally there would be two professionals (typically a paediatrician and an SLT) and sometimes also a student/trainee. One would play with DD (which was a bit like a mini-ADOS I think, to see how she played) while the other talked to us and asked us things about DD's development. It meant that by the time we got to her formal assessment they actually didn't take a new developmental history - they just based it on all those previous interviews (so we just did ADOS and they did a nursery visit).

DD always quite enjoyed it. I found it useful to take notes of anything I'd noticed about her development, any feedback from nursery, the red book if that contained anything relevant - that kind of thing.

Of course we found it pretty stressful and usually depressing when we got the report afterwards ... and then settled back gradually into just normal family life and enjoying DD until the next 6 monthly appointment!

We were told in our area that if you get sent for Dx then you are nearly always diagnosed. They don't send kids to do the ADOS etc. unless they are pretty sure. But again that might vary by area.

Hi LightTripper, thank you it really helps to hear other people's experience. What your describing kind of sounds like the 3 paediatrican appointments we've already had which have covered every area of development. I chat to the paediatrician whilst someone else (nurse?) does some tasks (growing skills assessment) with DD, then the paediatrician examines her.

I think what they meant when they used the phrase 'pre-assessment' to me was more of the general pathway which is really an information gathering exercise from all the referrals like SALT and nursery. I'm just not sure by the wording on the letter if they can make the assessment based on this or if this will lead them to do one big final one (ados possibly?) if they think she probably is autistic to make it official.

*you're describing

Oh yes - sounds like it could actually be a panel where they make the Decision?

I would just call the number on the letter (assuming there is one) and ask. It will be some terminology they use internally and whoever you get on the phone will almost certainly know what it means and how it all works. We always found they kind of implicitly expect a lot of knowledge, but if we called or e-mailed to ask e.g. what was happening at a particular appointment they were always happy to tell us (even if I always thought they could have worked out that they will be dealing with a lot of parents with autistic traits who would rather like to know what's coming ... it must be that famed NT empathy at play... ).

I just wanted to add a short update to this as I've had a few people reach out after reading my threads. My DD is now 4 and has been diagnosed with autism. Information was gathered from pre-school/school, SALT and then she had one final appointment for the autism assessment.

Thanks for the update! I hope she is doing OK?

Yes, she is doing well, thank you. She's made lots of progress in the last year and starting school has really helped her speech and social skills.