At Headspace Guildford we offer an Autism Spectrum Condition (ASC, also called ASD) assessment pathway for children and young people aged 5-18 years. This gives you the chance to explore whether your child/young person has autism. We provide these assessments with the intention of understanding your child/young person in an individualised way in their own context (formulation-driven) rather than just giving them a diagnosis of autism (diagnosis-driven). This is in order to best understand how your child/young person can be supported.
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The Assessment
Autism assessments at Headspace Guildford are conducted in accordance with best practise guidance from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE). The assessments involve collecting information from you as the child/young person’s parents or caregivers, your child/young person themselves, your child/young person’s school and potentially other professionals your child/young person has had involvement with (such as Speech and Language Therapists). The assessment consists of the following stages:
Referral
This is typically from yourselves, but other routes such as via Schools and General Practitioners are also accepted.
Telephone consultation- Free
At Headspace Guildford a free 15-minute consultation is offered prior to any appointments. These 15 minutes give you the chance to explain to the clinician the issues and difficulties that your child might be facing. The clinician in turn will ask questions as to what is happening. This space enables the clinician to get a better understanding of what the needs are of the child and enables the parents to decide whether this form of intervention would be appropriate for their child. A telephone consultation is just a short conversation. It is not an assessment, but a chance to hear about the challenges you are facing and think about what might help.
Assessment and screening appointment- £155
You might not be sure if an autism assessment is the right thing for your child. We always offer an initial assessment and screening appointment so you can discuss with us whether going ahead with the full assessment is going to be appropriate and helpful.
Formal Assessment- £2495
Background information and questions
Forms containing questions and screening measures are completed by yuou as parents, your child/young person (depending on their age) and school.
These forms involve gathering information relating to concerns about the child/young person, experiences of home and school life, developmental history, medical history, and potential differential diagnoses.
Autism Diagnostic Interview-Revised (ADI-R)
This is a structured diagnostic interview with parents It focuses on a child/young person’s behaviours in the areas of social interaction, communication and language, and patterns of behaviour, both currently and earlier in their development.
Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS)
This is a semi-structured, standardised assessment of communication, social interaction and imagination undertaken with your child/young person.
Multidisciplinary Team (MDT) discussion
Two Clinical Psychologists with extensive experience in working with autism provide the assessment, supported by our Assistant Psychologist who brings the work together. A discussion between the clinicians takes place to decide whether your child/young person meets the criteria for a diagnosis of autism.
Report
A report is written that brings together all of the assessment information and a formulation of your child’s difficulties, including whether or not they meet criteria for a diagnosis of autism. Bespoke recommendations for home and school are made for each child/young person, regardless of whether they are given a diagnosis of autism or not. We will also signpost you to relevant sources of ongoing and further support as appropriate.
Feedback appointment
You (with your child/young person if appropriate) will meet with one or both clinicians. The clinician/s will feedback from the assessment, explain their formulation and discuss with you whether an autism spectrum diagnosis is appropriate. In addition, they will discuss individualised recommendations with you, based on your child’s particular pattern of strengths and difficulties.
Additional possibilities
School observation- £165
An observation of your child/young person in their school environment by one of the clinicians may be required if a discrepancy in your child/young person’s behaviour across settings has been indicated. This may be done before or after the ADI-R/ADOS.
Ongoing work- Normal costing structure
It might be highlighted in the feedback appointment that ongoing work would be beneficial such as helping yourselves and your child/young person to understand and make sense of their diagnosis. This can be offered by Headspace Guildford, or we can make an onward referral via the NHS or elsewhere.
Throughout the assessment pathway, whilst we do ask about your child/young person’s difficulties, we are equally interested in your child/young person’s strengths. Therefore, we will also ask about these. We recognise that autistic individuals purely see and respond to the world in different ways to those around them and have a wealth of strengths such as creativity, honesty, intelligence, detail-orientation, amongst so many others. We will be advocating for schools to view autism in such a way too, in order for schools to learn to provide better support for autistic children/young people.
Please do contact us using the ‘contact us’ function on this website or email psychologyheadspaceguildford@gmail.com