ADHD Assessments
A Comprehensive ADHD Assessment
ADHD assessments in Sheffield at MODUS are designed to provide a thorough understanding of whether ADHD may explain the difficulties you are experiencing. The assessment looks beyond a checklist of symptoms, exploring your developmental history, current experiences and the impact these may have across different areas of your life.
What Does an ADHD Assessment Involve?
MODUS provides comprehensive ADHD assessments for adults, children and young people.
An ADHD assessment usually takes around 2 hours and is carried out in accordance with NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) guidance. The assessment has two main parts.
The first is a detailed clinical and developmental interview. Although this is sometimes referred to as a semi structured interview, in practice it is much more conversational. It provides an opportunity to talk through your current difficulties, childhood and developmental history, mental and physical health, education, work, relationships and other areas of everyday life. This helps to build a fuller picture and to consider whether there may be other factors contributing to the difficulties you are experiencing.
The second part uses the DIVA-5 for adults and the Young DIVA-5 for children and young people, a peer reviewed, semi structured diagnostic interview based on DSM-5 (Diagnostic Statistical Manual) criteria. It explores symptoms of inattention and hyperactivity/impulsivity in both childhood and adulthood, together with examples of how these may affect different areas of your life.
An ADHD diagnosis is never made on the basis of a questionnaire or symptom score alone. The information gathered throughout the assessment is considered as a whole when reaching a diagnostic conclusion.
Before Your Assessment
Before your appointment, you will be asked to complete a small number of questionnaires. These provide useful background information to help to build a picture of your current experiences before we meet.
Where possible, it is also helpful to obtain information from someone who knew you during childhood, such as a parent or other family member. Adults are welcome to bring someone with them to the assessment if they wish, although this is not essential. If childhood information is not available, this does not prevent an assessment from taking place.
For children and young people, a parent or guardian will need to attend the assessment and will be involved in providing developmental and childhood information. Where appropriate, information may also be gathered from school or another educational setting.
After Your Assessment
Following the assessment, all of the information gathered is considered together to determine whether the diagnostic criteria for ADHD are met.
The outcome will be discussed with you and you will receive a comprehensive written report explaining the assessment findings and, diagnostic conclusion.
With your consent, a copy of the report can also be sent to your NHS GP or another relevant healthcare professional.
A Thorough and Individual Approach
ADHD assessment is about more than identifying symptoms. It is an opportunity to understand the pattern of difficulties you have experienced and to consider whether ADHD provides the best explanation for them.
My aim is to make the assessment thorough and evidenced based, but also relaxed and collaborative. There are no right or wrong answers and you do not need to worry about giving a particular response. The aim is simply to build as accurate a picture as possible of you and your experiences.