If your child sees or has been seen by Dr. Stephen Camarata...

[Anonymous]

For us there was no follow up, even when we called and wrote repeatedly asking for help. For us, the predictions were wrong and the planned therapies were not helpful and no one helped with any follow up so the evaluation was useless and in actuality it delayed our son getting appropriate therapy at a critical time in his life. I regret taking DS there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A "neuropsych" is not actually an objective thing. It's a set of exams that your child may or may not need. What IS true is that an 8 year old with continued social and language struggles ought to get a full ASD eval (which includes the ADOS and a team of clinicians) at a place like KKI or Children's. I'm skeptical about the solo/for-profit practices that would charge you $5000 for a "neuropsych exam" uncovered by insurance. Go to the ASD clinic at a major children's hospital and take it from there. (Also, the value of seeking out a practitioner several states away because you think they have some sort of magic diagnostic powers is questionable to me. Developmental orders are fairly common; it's not like some kind of rare cancer where it might make sense to travel to see the ONE specialist across the country.)

This.

The purpose is to get help for this kid. At 8 years old not speaking to peers is slightly problematic. He won't be 8 forever and at 13, 16, 21--what a dismal future. It could be autism, it could be anxiety, it could be OCD, it could be a language disorder...it just makes sense to get updated diagnoses if there as well as age appropriate strategies through a neuropsych.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
At 8 years old not speaking to peers is slightly problematic. He won't be 8 forever and at 13, 16, 21--what a dismal future.

I agree kids need help but how can you say for sure that he won't outgrow the issue with age(13, 16, 21) even without any help?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
At 8 years old not speaking to peers is slightly problematic. He won't be 8 forever and at 13, 16, 21--what a dismal future.

I agree kids need help but how can you say for sure that he won't outgrow the issue with age(13, 16, 21) even without any help?

Because meanwhile the other kids' skills are advancing, while his aren't. As kids get older it gets much harder to catch up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
At 8 years old not speaking to peers is slightly problematic. He won't be 8 forever and at 13, 16, 21--what a dismal future.

I agree kids need help but how can you say for sure that he won't outgrow the issue with age(13, 16, 21) even without any help?

Because meanwhile the other kids' skills are advancing, while his aren't. As kids get older it gets much harder to catch up.

I think it's not a race , who talks/communicates more wins! Kids should have good enough communication to succeed in life, not like they should be in 80-90 percentile!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
At 8 years old not speaking to peers is slightly problematic. He won't be 8 forever and at 13, 16, 21--what a dismal future.

I agree kids need help but how can you say for sure that he won't outgrow the issue with age(13, 16, 21) even without any help?

If he doesn't outgrow it by 21, it will be too late. So give him the help early on, it may be necessary and it won't hurt.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
At 8 years old not speaking to peers is slightly problematic. He won't be 8 forever and at 13, 16, 21--what a dismal future.

I agree kids need help but how can you say for sure that he won't outgrow the issue with age(13, 16, 21) even without any help?

Because meanwhile the other kids' skills are advancing, while his aren't. As kids get older it gets much harder to catch up.

I think it's not a race , who talks/communicates more wins! Kids should have good enough communication to succeed in life, not like they should be in 80-90 percentile!

Well good enough would being able to communicate with peers at the very least academically and ideally socially.

No one knows the future, but this dynamic isn't likely to change without intervention. This may include but not limited to medication, social skills group, speech therapy based on a differentiated diagnosis. Saying what it's not, doesn't help. Figuring out what it IS needs to happen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
At 8 years old not speaking to peers is slightly problematic. He won't be 8 forever and at 13, 16, 21--what a dismal future.

I agree kids need help but how can you say for sure that he won't outgrow the issue with age(13, 16, 21) even without any help?

If he doesn't outgrow it by 21, it will be too late. So give him the help early on, it may be necessary and it won't hurt.

Agreed!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
At 8 years old not speaking to peers is slightly problematic. He won't be 8 forever and at 13, 16, 21--what a dismal future.

I agree kids need help but how can you say for sure that he won't outgrow the issue with age(13, 16, 21) even without any help?

Because meanwhile the other kids' skills are advancing, while his aren't. As kids get older it gets much harder to catch up.

I think it's not a race , who talks/communicates more wins! Kids should have good enough communication to succeed in life, not like they should be in 80-90 percentile!

Well good enough would being able to communicate with peers at the very least academically and ideally socially.

No one knows the future, but this dynamic isn't likely to change without intervention. This may include but not limited to medication, social skills group, speech therapy based on a differentiated diagnosis. Saying what it's not, doesn't help. Figuring out what it IS needs to happen.

Agreed!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For services , you get a the ASD diagnosis(even though if the child have just language delay) from Local Pediatrician to satisfy insurance requirements. For differential diagnosis see Dr.Camrata(to satisfy ourselves).

So have your local pediatrician help you commit insurance fraud while you tell everyone your kid isn't actually autistic, he just looks that way, and don't bother with any real testing, just go to this guy in Tennesee, he will tell you what you want to hear.

I know plenty of people who went to him and didn't hear what they wanted to hear. i.e., their children were diagnosed with autism. And Camarata does real testing -- it matched with school testing and with psychologist testing. And we didn't provide him with the other earlier test results. The difference was for us that he spent 3 hours with us, answering our questions, telling us what the test results meant and giving us ideas about how to approach the future. His wife was very helpful for the school angle.


We saw him a long time ago, so may be the difference. I agree they've gotten very busy. For us, getting the reports was often slow.

But I also know of people who do what the PP said: get an autism diagnosis to cover therapies, and see Camarata for the differential diagnosis.

[Anonymous]

There is a possibility that it is autism though. The pp doesn't need to fly to TN; there are plenty of practitioners locally. I truly hope she gets some answers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a possibility that it is autism though. The pp doesn't need to fly to TN; there are plenty of practitioners locally. I truly hope she gets some answers.

Not for language disorders. Most are generalists for SN and don't do all the testing that they do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For services , you get a the ASD diagnosis(even though if the child have just language delay) from Local Pediatrician to satisfy insurance requirements. For differential diagnosis see Dr.Camrata(to satisfy ourselves).

So have your local pediatrician help you commit insurance fraud while you tell everyone your kid isn't actually autistic, he just looks that way, and don't bother with any real testing, just go to this guy in Tennesee, he will tell you what you want to hear.

I know plenty of people who went to him and didn't hear what they wanted to hear. i.e., their children were diagnosed with autism. And Camarata does real testing -- it matched with school testing and with psychologist testing. And we didn't provide him with the other earlier test results. The difference was for us that he spent 3 hours with us, answering our questions, telling us what the test results meant and giving us ideas about how to approach the future. His wife was very helpful for the school angle.


We saw him a long time ago, so may be the difference. I agree they've gotten very busy. For us, getting the reports was often slow.

But I also know of people who do what the PP said: get an autism diagnosis to cover therapies, and see Camarata for the differential diagnosis.

He spent 3-4 hours with us too and was helpful in person. He doesn't tell you what you want to hear but he didn't have much to say as we were with a great therapist, great school situation and child was doing ok. Agree you go for the differential diagnosis and a more specific one. Calling something autism doesn't clearly say where it is or where the highest needs are. There is such a huge range with these kids. He's look at far more than just autism and language disorders. He's also looking gat learning and other disabilities. Personally, I wouldn't bother going as you don't get a good report and support long term.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a possibility that it is autism though. The pp doesn't need to fly to TN; there are plenty of practitioners locally. I truly hope she gets some answers.

One reason to go is even with flight, hotel and evaluation costs its still far cheaper than local evaluations and you get a fun trip to Nashville out of it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
At 8 years old not speaking to peers is slightly problematic. He won't be 8 forever and at 13, 16, 21--what a dismal future.

I agree kids need help but how can you say for sure that he won't outgrow the issue with age(13, 16, 21) even without any help?

If he doesn't outgrow it by 21, it will be too late. So give him the help early on, it may be necessary and it won't hurt.

+1, however, at 8 we found that speech wasn't as helpful as it was from 3-5/6. At 8, we didn't find it very beneficial but given the concerns I would be doing speech therapy and getting a full evaluation, especially with academics.

None of us will ever know if speech and other services helped our children however, can you live with yourself not doing it and having a negative outcome. I'd rather spend the time and money doing it now so I know I tried to give my child every possible opportunity to succeed. A part of me thinks my child would have the same outcome if we didn't do it but it did give him the tools so when he was ready to talk and use them he could. Its not about an instant fix, but long term and giving them the tools they need so when they can, they will have them ready to use them.