Psychology is a study of the mind, and how the mind influences our thoughts, feelings, emotions and behaviours. Helping us to understand what makes us feel and behave the way we do, can be very beneficial in how we communicate our needs, understand ourselves more, and how we deal with a wide range of issues. Like Counselling, seeking help from a Psychologist can help with many issues such as Depression, Anxiety, & Bereavement, however, Psychologists also facilitate specific mental health assessments and can diagnose and provide therapy for certain conditions such as ADHD and Personality Disorders.
Whatever the case may be, here at The Hazelton Clinic there is a team of experienced Counsellors who will listen and provide an impartial, professional, confidential service.
What to expect before attending ADHD initial consultation?
- The ADHD assessment measures important features of clinical history related with difficulties in regular life. This assessment must be done by trained mental health professional.
- One of the objectives is to determine the cause of attentional difficulties. Even if the patient is complaining about attentional difficulties, the specialist must determine the root cause of the difficulties experiencing. ADHD is one of the diagnoses to explain attentional difficulties, however, other issues can also explain the attentional problems.
- By DSM-V criteria, the diagnoses carried out is for: registering patient’s concerns about his/her attentional problems. Also, it IS MANDATORY to discard any other conditions that produces attentional difficulties similar to ADHD such as depression, anxiety or any other conditions. Also, the chronological age at which symptoms of a difficulties first appear in an individual has to be prior to 12 years old. That is the reason why mental examination and first initial interview has to be carried out before actual assessment tests can be applied.
- A general interview includes a mental examination and register symptoms that client reports. The clinician then validates symptoms and indicates whether these are clinically significant. After this an assessment is carried if all other possible difficulties are disregarded.
- If a possibility of other disorders is found, a personality and psychological assessment has to be carried to determine whether or not the presenting symptoms can be more explanatory to other disorder. If other disorder is found, a pharmaceutical treatment plan is recommended with the appropriate professional together with therapy to symptoms relapse and if the client still complains about attentional difficulties, the ADHD assessment can be carried out then.
- ADHD could be co-occurring with other conditions such as ASD, Conduct Disorder, Personality Disorder among many others. That is the reason why a clinician must determine whether symptoms are related to ADHD or any other psychological condition.
- The assessment has to be carried with a psychometric measure of attention, including a continuous test performance for attention, a questionnaire with comparative norms and a personality questionnaire.
