The UK's NHS's Selective Manner of Autism Diagnosis

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Hello Velorum!

Hopefully, my reply to MrsPeel above shows you that I'm on the same page as you. You may be interested in my post [TBD 'cos Cloudflare is triggering on including a link again ] about the misdiagnosis.



It is encouraging that private diagnosis is more reliable. If we can just transfer that skillset into the NHS ...

Splitety, splitety, split ...

However, after my rant above about needing a piece of paper to show to employers, I think the cost (could I translate BTDT's $1,500 to about £1,000?) is beyond me and many. Really, the diagnosis of mental conditions (rather than illnesses) should be on par with certifying physical conditions. If anyone starts saying that all this extra work diagnosing and certifying high-functioning autism will itself take NH resources, I say that that happening already, but we get nothing to show for it because of a stupid, ignorant, unholistic attitude.

The only two contra-indicative diagnostic (if I have used that term corectly) things needed are those to spot malingerers and fraudsters.

Precontemplative.

Hello ASPartOfMe!

nice handle! I see what you did there

I saw that story headlined by the BBC, but you saved me the effort of reading it!

I think this story shows something different and worse than the withholding of diagnosis that I ranted about. In this case, it is the rationing of mental healthcare services by Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) here in the UK. I have been told by parents of child OCD sufferers just how scary it is to deal with CAMHS.

I believe this rationing has been part of a 15 year strategy to run the NHS down, so that private healthcare can finally look attractive against the formerly superior welfare state NHS. The mental heath side of the NHS has been much easier to target, as it is a less frontline and less commonly accessed part of the NHS.

Precontemplative.

Hello MatchboxVagabond!

Oh absolutely! Hence the C for Compulsive. And yet, so many people, including the professionals, don't seem to understand about the compulsivity:

"But can't you just not do that?! I don't see why not ..."

"Because you don't feel what I feel! You can't see feelings!"

Precontemplative.

Certainly complete by 2012. I recall somone from hospital who was diagnosed with Bipolar, and he told me that he had come to believe that once one had a diagnosis, it will be the sole primary diagnosis and it will never be changed, no matter what happens next. The term "confirmation bias" comes to mind.

Later we were talking to another in the hospital, also with a bipolar diagnosis, and we asked him how that came about. He told us that he had seen Hitler as a grey-haired old man walk out of a shop in front of him. He told everyone about this, and got sectioned. Bipolar Disorder was diagnosed. We thought that was mad, as it was clearly a psychotic episode, which is nothing to do with Bipolar Disorder. I doubt he got the diagnosis changed.



Agree!



Is that true, though?

I know that OCD UK has trouble getting the NHS to realise that therapy with medication is a much more effective tratment than medication alone. However, Im not sure that medication is always cheaper than therapy in total. One can be on medication for life, and it's true cost can be much greater than the prescription fee.

Here in the UK, last year, there was a lot of fuss about a medication for ADHD being withdrawn on ground of cost.

Precontemplative.

Hello Mountain Goat!

Oh. I thought "high-functioning" refered to capability, such as speech, or learning. (Not doubting you about I.Q.!)



That ties in with my rant about employers, that undiagnosed autists inevitably end up in that "I just can't do this anymore" situation, and they don't know why. So, if they can then get a diagnosis, then they can say "it's okay, I found out the reason, we need to do this to fix it!"



Yeah, that happens to me too. I followed the link in your sig, and found all this lovely information. I wanted to read it all, but after an hour, I remembered that I meant to spend today posting replies here. What a distraction you provided!

Precontemplative.

While I am not British I have been posting about this for years and what I have gathered is the problem is a of lack of competent assessors due to a combination of misunderstanding of Autism and various Austerity measures. This has resulted in years long waits for assessments, an informal triage system that excludes level 1 types, and results in very obvious autistics being left in psych wards for years because there is literally no other place to put them.

A frustrating aspect of this is unlike in most places where this type of thing is a result of ignorance the mainstream British media has often reported about this for years.