First meeting with the Child Development Team - What to expect?

[ALMummy]

Just as the title says.

Would be really grateful for any information on how this will go and what to expect.

Thanks.

How old is your DC. My ds4 is assessed by CDT every 6 months.

First visit usually information/ background gathering and simple observation - I felt like a performing seal at our first few - but it's a really good way to get all therapy support that is required in place, and also to keep the whole team aware of development and in touch with each other. Usually referrals to specific areas done after first visit, so subsequent meetings will be with appropriate therapy team and paed and not heads of sheds. Assuming you haven't already got those? If you have it will be them doing most of the work and swopping info with each other and you can relax and watch!

He is 5. We haven't had any other meetings apart from with our GP. So this will be just a general meeting then? I am very nervous.

make a list of everything that is concerning you/ school and check you have discussed everything before you leave - even if it doesn't seem relevant - that way all the referrals can be done in one batch and the system will eventually lurch into life... and take a really deep breath and remember they aren't there to look at your parenting skills, even though it might feel like they are - they are far more interested in DS and you are pretty boring in the long run! - just mentioned that as a lot of people feel 'under the microscope' as it were...

Well it went ok. We didn't finish today, have to go back for another appointment but they were quite open about telling us they think he is somewhere high up on the autism spectrum without appearing to have any learning difficulties so thats pretty positive. I knew it anyway and was very open with them about expecting to hear that so they didn't seem to feel the need to pussy foot around. Found myself waffling on at various points - probably why we didn't finish today . They are going to observe him at school. So glad the process has started tbh. Compared to how I felt a 18 months ago when concerns were first raised, the relief is tremendous. Never thought I would get to this point really, where I just feel utter relief that there has been some sort of confirmation and everyone is on board and I am not alone with it.

I posted a few minutes ago about starting this process- could you kindly tell me how this works? I presume you have to ask GP for a referral or can you call them directly?

Yes you have to get a referral through your GP (I am in this process myself - my dd (6) is waiting to be assessed at the CDC). In my case it helped that I took a report that the Educational Psychologist she saw at school had done which mentioned the possibility of ASD. If your child is having problems at school Mamax it might help persuade the GP to refer you if they see that school are concerned as well. Hope this helps.

Hi Mamax4 - yes concerns were raised at DS's school and they referred him to the Ed Pychologist who suggested that they could refer him to the Child Development Team or we could take him to our GP. We chose to go to our GP because apparently this can sometimes be quicker and also we wanted to go a route where we would be dealing with the appropriate services directly. I didn't really feel comfortable leaving it down to the school and having them act as a middle man.