New Study: High Autism Rates Due To Over-Diagnosis

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Someone may have stated that you can get a diagnosis if you want, but that doesn't make it true.

In my pre-obama care experience it was very hard to find a diagnostician who would take a sliding scale payment that was anything close to affordable. When you did, you had one chance, take it or leave it. There was no way to find out whether someone was liberal or conservative with the diagnosis ahead of time.

The things you describe seem to belong either to fantasy or to some world very different than the one I have been living in.

I think what Phemto was saying was that for people who are pursuing a DX, they can play up their own symptoms either consciously or subconsciously.

That would obviously assume this was for a person who did have the finances to pursue the DX, or at least that would be my assumption.

I don't think Phalto was speaking in financial terms as far as "can," that wasn't the point as far as I could tell.

This.

What are the reasons people are so desperate to define themselves as True Autistics and others as False Autistics? These discussions go on endlessly and seem to be crucial to people's self-understanding, yet I don't really see what is to be gained from it.

This is what I'd like to see a paper on.

It seems there is a strong wish for autism to be a YES/NO thing and not a spectrum, but the world is not obliging.

Imagine that a definite test arrived tomorrow, that confirmed most people's thoughts about themselves but gave some people a surprise. What would be the consequences?

I'm going to go out on a limb here. At least some autistics have trouble conceptualizing soft issues. They like things that can be systematized into a set of hard and inflexible rules. I wonder if they're the ones we hear about who don't want to accept that a "real diagnosis" is not some sort of infallible decree from on high.

Thanks NoWhereWoman. You're right. I wasn't really talking about different peoples financial situations, there, but since it's come up... Some of us are better off than others. Not everyone can pay $3000 for a neuropsych evaluation. When it comes to medical professionals you often get what you get, and they all have different biases. For a lot of people, self-diagnosis or parent-diagnosis is all they can afford. I don't think they should be excluded based on finance or geography.

For a time I lived in a rural community. Doc Moe, the local doctor, didn't really believe in psychological disorders. He figured depression just meant you weren't getting enough exercise. I doubt my son would have had much luck getting an AS diagnosis if we still lived there. I didn't know anyone there with a diagnosis, but I knew plenty who probably deserved one.

Whew, I can relate, have had a "Doc Moe" or two in my time...the old "you can spank ADHD out of a child" and "depression just means you aren't getting outdoors enough" types.

As for the expensive DX, can absolutely relate there, too. If I suddenly stumble across $3000 I will be fixing our back roof or paying off the car, not buying a DX that ultimately (at this stage of the game) won't help me much. Totally get that as I'm living it and I know a whole lot of other people are too.