I am someone who has a hard time discussing my daughters focus symptoms with the Doctor and really knowing if I am being too critical of her focus because she is my kid. I started video taping her in dance class and at swim lessons to show to my husband. In these clips you can see some of her "wiggles" compared to the rest of the class.
Do you think it is crazy and unhelpful to show some of these clips to the doctor? Will they think I am being overkill. I very much want an accurate diagnosis on if she has ADHD and the questionnaires are really hard for me to fill out without being subjective.
Has anyone done this?
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kondasa
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Hi, I don’t think it’s crazy and can be useful to your doctor. Also, l know what you mean about those forms. To me, the more information given to a dr the better the diagnosis.
I have not videotaped my daughter (she doesn't like me to take pictures of her unless she wants it - which is rarely - I try to sneak pictures sometimes, that doesn't always work either). I don't think it is over kill. The more info one has is better. All the doctor can say is no, he doesn't want to/or need to see them. I know the questionnaire questions are crazy hard the way they are written/worded. My daughter is different at school than she is at home so the questionnaire were different as night and day, with some similarities in some areas. Good luck. I would use the videos. My daughter is diagnosed with ADHD of both kinds, ODD, OCD, Anxiety-NOS and Sensory issues.
I know what you mean. I resisted doing this and decided to take her to a pediatric neuro psychologist for a full neuropych evaluation. This made it much more about their observations as doctors. As my first child, I am really surprised how much kids mature. At age 7, she was pacing the room, laying on the table at her evaluation. At age 10, without meds, she is attending an academically rigorous school and mostly keeping track of her work. Between that is an emotional charged hormonal stage that is very scary. I'm now giving her space and letting her take responsibility. When I was analyzing her with too much focus, her self esteem really suffered. She also developed learned helplessness from my intervening. She's getting stronger. So anyway, that was a tangent. Hurrying off to school....good luck!
Very helpful!! My daughter is definitely picking up on my ques and developing aome self esteem issues and even plays into my worries. I need to back off and I even considered stopping the entire ADHD assessment thing because of what it was doing to her.
I understand & felt the same way myself. How old is your daughter.
Talking to teachers helped us, as they have a better sense of what is developmentally normal. They might be uncomfortable answering about ADHD specifically, but they will talk about behaviors they see. And then Ibalways ask if they feel if the behavior is beyond he range of normal for the age. If they say “yes”, I take that to the doctor.
Just talk to your doctor about your concerns - it won’t necessarily trigger a diagnosis. They usually also want an evaluation from a teacher or coach or someone, to balance out the parent evaluation.
We also did a neuropsych, mostly to weed out comorbidities. Despite questionnaires that felt like I could give a different answer in a different day, the (expensive) 6 hour thorough examination gave the almaost exact same diagnosis as the 15 mins with the ped. Only difference was the diagnosis was adjusted to Combined from Inattentive. (It was very helpful for the school 504 though.) it was also a little reassuring, as I even asked if it could just be I rated too harshly, but he said with his observation & the teachers assessment, I could be confident that it wasn’t just me.
To my understanding, a 504 works better for students who can learn in a regular classroom and the same material, but just need some accommodations in the room, while an IEP might focus more on students who need more individualized instruction or different material due to their disability.
We are in the midst of an evaluation right now. Our assessor could care less about anecdotes or observations. She doesn’t even care what the psychologist who has been seeing him for two years thinks. Based on the computer tests she thinks ADHD is about out of the question. She is leaning toward Aspergers, but his every day psychologist disagrees and there is no computerized test for this one. Maybe try with the videos and see what your evaluator thinks. Are other people finding that the evaluators care more about the computerized tests then the parent and teacher rating scales?
We haven’t had any computerized tests at any stage of the process, either with the original pediatrician diagnosis nor the neuropsychological evaluation. Who is doing this assessment?
If anything, I felt the reverse that perhaps too much was relying on my observation. Thankfully the neuropsych calmed my concerns about that. But all the professionals we’ve dealt with have really listened to the parents a lot.
I am unfamiliar with a computer test to diagnose ADHD vs ASD - I am curious what she is using.
Well, there are two tests that are getting popular. Here's an article: pro.psychcentral.com/computerized-testing-for-adhd-is-it-useful/. We're pretty sure our assessor uses the Connors CPT. It's a video game style thing that's 14 minutes long, designed to be boring and require some concentration. Apparently our little guy aced that. But the day after the test I sent him upstairs and said he had 5 minutes: Go to the bathroom, fill up your water bottle, and if you have time, grab a book. I find him upstairs 12 minutes later, wandering around, hasn't gone to the bathroom, vaguely thinks he's still looking for a book. Yesterday, I hand him a plate to walk 5 feet over to the table. He takes the plate, has some kind of burst of energy where he yells "slam, boom!" and throws up his arms. The plate flies down and breaks. These things happen *all the time*. They happen at school. They happen at every day camp he goes to. So when she says, well, whatever he has I can't see ADHD in his testing, so maybe it's autism, it just seems weird. Parent and teacher scales should weigh something, not just be a reason to give a computer test that decides.
What did your neuropsychological evaluation include? That's what our assessor calls what he's getting too. I don't want to name the practice here, but it's a private psychological practice in Northern VA with an assessor who is a psychologist and specialized in psychological assessments.
Actually, looks like my son DID so one of the computerized tests, the TOVA. The neuropsychologist also had him do a WISC IQ test, NEPSY-2, Boston naming test, Hooper Visual Organization test, CHAMP, and WIAT-III, while I filled our the BRIEF-2 and CBCL questionnaires. (Though keep in mind, the neuropsychologist was looking for masking / comobordities. He was not making an initial ADHD diagnosis.)
Looks like my son’s TOVA score did suggest a weakness in sustained attention, though except for the first quarter of the test, the rest of his performance was average. That in itself may not have triggered a diagnosis, but when combined with my reports, teacher reports, and general observation, the only thing about the ADHD diagnosis the neuropsychologist changed was making it Combined instead of Inattentive. (My son doesn’t exactly li present the hyperactivity as expected, but he DEFINITELY has impulse control.) He also mentioned that kids tend to perform better in the evaluation setting, so it would be safe to assume things are a bit worse at home / normal life.
So, to sum up that really long post - I agree that just a computerized test isn’t enough, and definitely parents, teachers and other mental health professionals opinions should be taken into consideration at least.
Also, if it matters, our neuropsych was recommended by our pediatrician. He use to be in charge of neuropsychological testing for our children’s hospital before switching to a private practice.
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One of my worst fears
Difficulty getting 11yo diagnosed with inattentive ADHD
Would you “rock the boat” with meds?
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20 YEAR OLD DAUGHTER WITH INATTENTIVE ADHD AND ANXIETY
