We offer face to face assessments in Edinburgh every month. These will take place at a centrally located venue and will be conducted by Dr Emma Field.

The initial pre-assessment will take place online and the full assessment will take place face to face in Edinburgh. We recommend enquiring about suitable online pre-assessments first with Dr Emma Field and her next availability in Edinburgh for face to face assessments.

Pre-Assessment Consultation

£120

Whether you are looking to explore an assessment for ASD or ADHD, we offer a consultation appointment at the beginning of your journey with us to ensure that this is the right process for you. The pre-assessment lasts for approximately one hour.

During this session we aim to gather information and discuss you or your child’s personal history, background and reasons for a full diagnostic assessment. We will also carry out a screening assessment which helps to identify the possible presence of autism or ADHD.

This information will help us decide whether assessment is the right step for now. If it isn’t, then our journey will stop there and we can help identify any further appropriate sources of support for you.

However, if you choose to proceed with a full diagnostic assessment, then the cost of this pre-assessment consultation will be refunded from your full assessment fee.

This is a suitable process for clients how wish to clarify their symptoms first. Once clarified in a pre-assessment, most of our clients who proceed to assessment receive a positive diagnosis as long as their self-reporting can be corroborated by others close to them.

Assessment for ADHD

£730

We offer an ADHD assessment to children, adolescents and adults. We do not assess children under the age of 5. We are registered with all insurance companies including BUPA and AXA and recommend that booking a pre-assessment first.

Before the assessment you will be asked to complete a range of questionnaires. These will help support the clinician in making a fully supported, evidenced based diagnosis. During this session we aim to gather information and discuss you or your child’s personal history, background and reasons for a full diagnostic assessment. We will also carry out a screening assessment which helps to identify the possible presence of autism or ADHD.

You will also be asked to provide corroborating evidence from another person. This would preferably involve a partner, parent, sibling or friend. They can attend a part of the assessment with you, or the clinician can contact them afterwards. In booking an assessment, please be sure that you have someone else who can corroborate at least some of your symptoms.

Further corroborating evidence can also be gained from school reports, supporting letters or previous diagnostic reports. These are not essential but helpful.

Supporting evidence should be emailed or posted beforehand where possible. In the eventuality of a difficulty with this, please bring on the day.

During the assessment

The assessment involves the following parts:

  • A full developmental and psychiatric history
  • A full clinical and psychosocial assessment which includes discussion about behaviour and symptoms in different domains and settings of the person’s everyday life
  • Observer reports from family members/ close friends
  • Assessment of the person’s mental state
  • An assessment of the person’s needs, other mental health conditions, social, family and educational or occupational circumstances and physical health

After the assessment has been completed the result of the assessment will be discussed and include an explanation of the result of the assessment and whether or not ADHD is the most likely explanation. This might include suggested further referral and discussion about further treatment. Following the assessment a report will be completed and sent to the person, their GP and any other people involved in you care.

Assessment for Autism Spectrum Disorder

Adult and teenage assessment* and report

£1.500

Child assessment*
and report

£1.900

*Including the pre-assessment fee

We offer assessment and diagnostic services for adults (19+ years), teenagers (13-18 years) and children (5-12 years) who would like to explore the possibility that they are experiencing autistic spectrum disorder.

We assess for ASD in two or three phases to ensure a comprehensive assessment process. This process is sensitive and compassionate, tailored to the individual needs of each client. Where appropriate, speech and language as well as occupational therapists are invited to contribute to the assessment process.

Assessment makes use of the following two tools:

  • Autism Diagnostic Interview – Revised (ADI-R)
  • Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule version 2 (ADOS-2)

These are evidence based, ‘gold standard’ diagnostic tools. The combination of these two different tools increases the reliability and validity of the assessment outcome.

The process of assessment for adults usually takes place over two sessions with the assessment process, using ADI-R and ADOS-2, taking around 4 hours. When assessing a child, we may also observe them in school or at home, interview other members of the family or meet with wider professionals that may be involved in your child’s care or education.

We aim to schedule appointments as close together as possible so that the assessment process is reasonably efficient.

We recommend booking in for a pre-assessment first in order to explore symptoms and discuss who might attend the ADI-R with you. Our assessment process also involves a follow up session.

A ‘straight to assessment’ option

This is offered for both ASD and ADHD and is reduced by £120, skipping the pre-assessment option. This is suitable for those who have already been screened elsewhere or who feel that they do not need a pre-assessment. If you are interested in this option please enquire.

Dual assessment of ASD and ADHD

This involves three assessment sessions, two for ASD and one for ADHD, as would be for the single assessments. This may be identified at the pre-assessment, or you may have identified this yourself. We offer this halving the cost of the ADHD assessment to make the price more palatable for our clients. With a pre-assessment the total cost of this would be £1865. Without a pre-assessment this would cost £1745.

QB Test

£110

The QB test is used to help assess ADHD and to evaluate different treatments for people with ADHD when combined with the standard clinician assessment. The QB test is a web-based test that combines a Continuous Performance Task (CPT) with motion tracking to objectively measure the three core symptoms of ADHD; activity, attention and impulsivity and provide a likelihood for ADHD. It provides objectivity within an ADHD assessment and is not a separate independent diagnostic assessment for ADHD.

We recommend using it for children and young people to supplement clinical information. We can also use it for others on request. Please enquire on booking.

FAQs

We find that most educational institutions welcome a diagnosis as it helps to inform their practice with a child. Undiagnosed a child’s behaviours may be misinterpreted and they may receive more negative feedback that other children. With a diagnosis, not only can more individualised strategies be put in place but the understanding provided attunes the environment more suitably to your child. A diagnosis puts all those involved in a child’s care on the same footing and together they can work with this understanding to provide a more appropriate learning environment.

We use gold standard tools for all of our assessments. These tools are similarly used in the NHS. We have not had our validity or quality of our assessment reports refuted by a GP, NHS or educational institution and have also received praise for our rigorousness from some NHS professionals. Our assessments are performed to a high standard and meet the recommendations set out in the guidelines.
Our clinicians have been trained appropriately in the use of all tools.

For an ADHD assessment, you child may attend the initial pre-assessment process (if appropriate) and if not, will attend part of the main assessment. With younger children, parent and teacher reporting provides the bulk of our assessment data. For older children, they may be involved in the ADHD assessment process directly with their parents. For younger children, they will meet with the clinician and observed and assessed through a variety of ‘presses’ and the rest of the assessment will take place with parents alone.

For an ASD assessment, your child will be assessed directly using the ADOS-2 and through school observation. For older children, this may be reduced to the ADOS-2 and information may be accessed from the school via email communication.

For an ADHD assessment, we will ask your child’s school to complete some psychometric information about your child, which we will send to your child’s school. If neurodivergent symptoms span a range of ASD and ADHD then we will collect more detailed information initially to decide on an assessment process in conjunction with you, as parents. We prefer to work with your child’s school where possible and for an ASD assessment will visit the school and observe your child in that setting as well as engage in discussion with the teacher/ other professionals where possible.

We do provide a dual assessment process. This may be identified at a pre-assessment and provide a fuller understanding for the client.

It is currently estimated that 50-70% of individuals with ASD also have ADHD. Read here ASD and ADHD Comorbidity: What Are We Talking About? – PMC (nih.gov)

However, individuals with ADHD may exhibit some autistic traits but not meet the criteria for ASD. We will endeavour in our assessment process to identify any ASD that may additionally be present, or indeed any other comorbidities such as depression/ anxiety and OCD.

We understand that this can be costly and in the case of a dual assessment process offer the ADHD at half the cost