What happens at your assessment?

Some appointments will be for you and your parents/carers, other appointments will be just for you or just for your parents/carers. 

Some appointments can be quite short, and some can be quite long. Approximate length of appointments will be given in your appointment letter.

Some appointments will be for you and some will be for your parents/carers. 

If you or your parents/carers need to stop or take a break and come back that is fine.  

The first appointment is: 

• to get to know you, and more about your family 

• to talk about what we can do 

• to talk about what we can't do 

• to give you a chance to ask any questions 

• for you to choose if you want to carry on with the assessment   

Often two more appointments are offered 

• an appointment with you to do some activities and get to know you better 

• an appointment to speak with your parents or carers 

Sometimes, we need to find out more information.  We will think together, with you and your parent/carer, about what we need to do next. 

This could be: 

• meeting with us again 

• going to school/college to see you  

• visiting you at home 

• asking you, or someone that knows you well, to fill out some questionnaires (forms to find out more about you, for example what is easy for you and what is difficult) 

Our assessments do not include any x-rays, scans or blood tests.     

When we have enough information we can: 

• finish our assessment and tell you what we think.   

• write a report and send it to you and your GP. We can give you an extra copy of your report so you can share this if you want to; for example, with your school or college.  

If we say you are autistic, this is called the diagnosis.  

We can share the diagnosis with: 

• you and your parent/carer

• your parent/carer, and they can share this with you.   

Everyone is different and you can tell us how you would like us to share information with you.  There is further information about sharing a diagnosis here.

You can learn more about making sense of your diagnosis here:  Transition curve and description.pdf[pdf] 87KB 

If we say you don't have autism, we might be able to tell you if there is something else that we think helps explain why things are different or difficult for you.   

We can give you some advice and tell you about other services that might be able to help. This is called signposting.  

If you or your parents/carers have any questions about the assessment, diagnosis or report you or they can ring us and arrange to talk about it.