A. Pre-diagnostic Support
- Help and support
Many
clients seek advice from our team when they are unable to identify
the difficulties they are experiencing. For these clients, we have
experts who are skilled at unpicking the difficulties and then
helping to map out a plan. This plan may or may not involve the need
(or wish) for an Autism assessment.
- Therapy and / or behavioural advice
For
those who do not need or want an Autism assessment, we are able to
offer a range of services, such as Speech and Language Therapy,
Occupational Therapy (for sensory issues) and / or Behavioural
assessments and psychotherapy.
- Outreach visits to settings
Our
therapists can provide support at school or at an employment (or
other) setting to help make the placement work. This also applies to
school refusers.
- Medication or mental health / well-being review
Our
psychiatrists are able to offer advice about medication, and our
clinical psychologists can help to identify which type of
intervention may be best at that time.
In short, there are
many ways in which we are able to help children and adults, which
either precede or exclude the need for an Autism assessment.
B. Assessments
We offer 2 types of
assessment for children and adults: (1) the ADOS Assessment and (2) a
Full ASD Diagnostic Assessment.
1. The
ADOS Assessment – an Overview
The
ADOS (Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule) is a semi-standardised
assessment used across the UK as the gold standard to investigate a
number of areas of development:
- Social communication (language skills and features, gestures, conversation)
- Social interaction (eye contact, facial expression, back-and-forth interaction, emotional understanding, knowledge and understanding of relationships and social response)
- Restrictive and repetitive patterns of interest (imaginary thinking, any overriding / specific interests, sensory differences and ritualistic behaviour).
Fundamentally,
the ADOS is a tool to assess for the possibility of an Autism
Spectrum Disorder (ASD), and the results need to be verified by two
ADOS-trained practitioners. Behaviours are ‘scored’,
providing an indication of the likelihood of ASD diagnosis criteria
being met. This assessment
does not, on its own, diagnose for
ASD. It would typically be used
alongside a medical / developmental case history from family members
as well as information from other settings, such as school or work,
to inform the diagnosis process. It does determine strengths and
challenges, and the person who administers it would typically provide
recommendations on the basis of what they’ve observed - e.g.
difficulties with emotional understanding or reporting events
clearly.
2. Autism Spectrum
Disorders: Full assessment
The Owl Centre’s
team can formally identify and diagnose Autism, and we use the Autism
Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS - as described above) alongside
another comprehensive evaluation.
For further
information about the Full ASD assessment for Children, please see
this link:
For further
information about the Full ASD assessment for Adults, please see this
link:
C. Post-diagnostic Support
For clients who come
to The Owl Centre with an existing ASD diagnosis, or for those who
receive a diagnosis through one of our assessments, we are able to
provide post-diagnostic support. One of our
popular packages is designed by our Autism specialists who can help
you to:
- Understand what your diagnosis means to you.
- Work out what your Autism diagnosis means for you as a family.
- Signpost you to nationwide support groups and peer support.
- We offer a number of different types of psychotherapies as well as clinical psychology and psychiatry, which can help support anxiety or conditions such as agoraphobia, insomnia, or self-harming, for instance.
- Speech and Language Therapy might be particularly useful for social skills or processing difficulties.
- Occupational Therapy can be helpful for understanding and assessing sensory processing and emotional regulation difficulties.
- Advice and support for partners, siblings or family members who need to understand an individual’s diagnosis.
