Service categories: Diagnosticians

Service URL: https://www.autism.org.uk/diagnosis

The National Autistic Society Diagnostic and Assessment Service provides an exceptionally high standard of care and support to those seeking an assessment for autism as well enabling other services to deliver high quality services through our professional training and consultancy programmes.

We offer a range of specialist diagnostic and assessment services for children, young people and adults, using the Diagnostic Interview for Social and Communication Disorders (DISCO) alongside other assessment tools as recommended by NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence). Anyone in the UK or overseas can access our service if funding is available. We provide a free triage service on receipt of referral information to assess if we are best placed to meet your assessment needs. The DISCO is a semi-structured interview designed to systematically gather information about a person’s strengths and challenges, as well as their developmental profile. The DISCO is usually undertaken with somebody who knows the person well, for example, a parent or carer. In addition to the DISCO there will also be an age-appropriate clinical interview with the person undergoing the assessment. Other semi-structured assessments may also be part of the assessment, for example, the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS-2), and/or other more structured language and cognitive assessments.

We bring together all this information to formulate a clear diagnosis and recommendation of needs and prepare in-depth reports. We take care to consider the interventions already in place and think about where it might be possible to endorse current practice. If we think further intervention or new options for a person are necessary, we give guidance for consideration.

Aimed at: Adolescent , Adult , Child , Young person

Referral Sources: NHS and Private, Yourself

Specialisms: Exclusively autism specific