ClaireAnderson

Hi Lynda Thank you very much for your reply. It's good to hear from someone else in Scotland who has "local" knowledge. I will contact them tomorrow, C

Hi Sally44 Thanks for these weblinks. I'll have a look at them tonight. All advice is much appreciated Claire

Hi, had a quick look last night but was wondering if anyone here had had good experiences with a specific Psych consultant. I will have another look tonight. Thanks x

Hi Lynda My son has been through the "staged intervention" process in Scotland and is currently Stage 3. He was referred to Speech and Language Therapy at nursery school then this went to stage two when the educational psychologist was brought in 18 months ago in Primary One. On her observations my son progressed to Stage 3 which, by law, is a referral to CAMHS and in his case, to see a Child Psychiatrist who specialises in ASD diagnosis. The Psychiatrist went on sick leave just as we received an appointment and we saw a locum. This visit was most unsatisfactory and we were not told how the process was going to move forward. She neglected to provide us with a report and advice on the next stage of the diagnois which we have learned retrospectively, is a requirement of the process. For example, our son was observed at school by a Mental Health Pracitioner from CAMHS without us being aware of this. There has also been a change in management at his school and a temporary head and assistant head teacher are in place and we have had just one review meeting this school year when last year we had five. The previous assistant head teacher was very well rehearsed in Staged Intervention and keep us up to date with details and sadly this hasn't happened since she retired. The educational psychologist has been particularly poor. At the diagnosis meeting she had to constantly refer to her notes which were taken over a year ago (some of the information in these notes was irrelevant, such as my son holding his pencil in a "claw", he no longer does this) and thankfully, the speech therapist who had observed my son at school two days beforehand was able to feedback on my son's progress (The ASD outreach team have been working with him at school for 12 months) which essentially, changed the Psychiatrist's diagnosis from Childhood Autism at the start of the meeting to Aspeger's. I feel that if the Speech therapist hadn't been present we would have recevied a very different diagnosis There have been other minor blips along the way but these are the most significant. Thanks for replying Claire

My eldest son (aged 6) was diagnosed with Asperger's last week. There were certain elements in the diagnosis process that my husband and I are not happy with. Can anyone recommend another ASD Psychiatrist we can approach for a second opinion? We are happy to travel anywhere within the UK. Thanks!