I am completely confused and messed up by making the appt. with the developmental pediatrician. I thought I had a clue as to what they do and apparently I was wrong. I went there thinking they would help me as a parent know what I need to do and what my son needs. Well, they were unsure as to why Iw as there since my son had already been diagnosed. They apparently diagnose and make a plan for what he needs. I jumped the gun.

My son has been dignosed by a psychologist and she is in the process of preparing the paperwork which will have his official diagnosis and recomendations for what help he needs. I should have waited for this meeting with her to go over it.

The Dev. Ped has a little bit different approach to diagnosis. She would have evaluations done by her psychologist (including IQ test), speech therapist, neurologist and her evaluation. Then she would use all these evaluations to make her diagnosis and form a plan for what services he will need to attain his max. level of social/education development.

So, how does this differ from what our psychologist will do? The Psyc. will probably show in her treatment plan many of the same needs like speech therapy and so forth but it won't show an actual evaluation by these specialist it would be based on her opinion as to what he needs. I mean she conversed with him I am sure she can tell what he is lacking in speech and so forth.

Now, what am I to do? Should I go with the Dev Ped and have a 2nd opinion of sorts and a little more thourough evaluation? Something to note is that the Dev Ped happens to be the Chief of Staff at USF Medical Center for Child Development. She is also a paid consultant for the school board (in which my son is in). I asked her if when the schools do their evaluations do they typically disagree with outside eval and recomendations? She said sometimes they will however she said they rarely do with her given the fact that they pay her as an consultant on her opinion in many developmental issues, so to question her evaluation would be rather silly and I guess unethical. So, it is likely that an evaluation done from her may hold more than the one done from our psyc. However, she by all means did not discredit or question our current diagnosis.

So, what do I do?????? Help!

I think you will find that the Dev. Ped. evaluation will be more thorough in it's recommendations on how to proceed. There are more specialists involved and their recommendations should be listed in the evaluation report too. With the psych. you are getting just one person's observations and recommendations. I've had evaluations by both for my son, and found the dev. ped. was more useful.

It is also important to remember that all the testing usually doesn't give a true accounting for our children's capabilies and especially a true accounting of intelligence. My son always tests poorly because he is nonverbal. He also will go through a complete session not doing the majority of the tasks even though I know he can do them. He does them at home. Keep this in mind when reading through the results of any evaluation and concentrate on the recommendations to help him. Above all, remember he's your child, you love him, and you know what is best.

It's not uncommon for our kids to get several diagnostic workups under their belts. (Though we parents end up w/a little less padding in our wallets) HTH.