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Evaluation

When caregivers sense that their child is having challenges participating at home, school, or daycare, or connecting with friends, they may need support in understanding whether there are neurodevelopmental differences or other conditions causing these behavioral issues. DFX can provide a family with a comprehensive evaluation that may uncover the reasons their child is struggling.

  • At DFX we typically schedule an assessment for one day, starting at 9:00. The length of the assessment days varies depending on the child’s age and the scope of the assessment but children will usually be at DFX for 3-5 hours. Throughout the day, we take breaks for movement, play, and snacks/lunch as needed.

  • You will be asked to complete our intake paperwork, which includes a detailed developmental history questionnaire. On the day of the assessment, you will be asked more in-depth questions about your child’s history through a clinical interview to ensure we have accurate information and fully understand your concerns. You will be given various parent/caregiver questionnaires that will help us get standardized data regarding how they show up with you at home. You will also attend a feedback session following the assessment day to talk over the findings and recommendations. 

  • We love to consult with anyone in your child’s life and would be happy to talk with your child’s teacher or anyone else you find to have important information about your child’s life. We will ask you to sign a release of information for any individual you would like us to talk with.

  • You can tell your child that they will be doing various “brain games” or “brain tasks” to help us learn more about how their brain learns and processes information. Let them know that some things might feel easy, others may feel a bit harder. We will take breaks and have fun along the way. You can let your child know they will be doing a lot of different things, such as looking at pictures and patterns, answering some questions, showing what they learned in school, putting puzzles or blocks together, and playing.

  • A feedback session is scheduled with the parents/caregivers about 2-3 weeks after the assessment date. At that session, we will talk about all the things we learned from the assessment and recommendations for supporting your child. You will receive a comprehensive written report 1-2 days following the feedback session.  

Evaluation FAQs

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Tracy Stackhouse and coworker at DFX

What happens during an evaluation?

The DFX Clinical Team can provide a full team assessment involving speech-language, occupational therapy, and psychology, separate or in combination. We determine which methods are most appropriate to use in working with your child and carefully craft an evaluation team based on questions you and/or your provider answered during the referral and intake process. Our team approach is unique and critical for the assessment of neurodevelopmental disorders and when learning, developmental, and behavioral questions arise. 

The underlying cause of a challenge is not always clear and psychological evaluations generally are aimed at learning more about the reasons why someone may be struggling (at school/with learning, making friends, following directions, regulating emotions and behavior, paying attention, etc.).

We engage in clinical observations throughout the assessment, which provide valuable insight into how your child approaches tasks and what type of support they do or do not need to perform certain tasks. This gives us tangible information about what kind of skills we can help your child learn so they can feel successful in their daily life. Throughout the evaluation process, we also gather information from your child’s community and learn what resources may be needed to support your child holistically.

How does DFX share evaluation results?
Thoughtful case conferences with families complete the assessment process, where the DFX evaluation team will share information, gain more understanding of a family’s priorities for the child, and make recommendations for treatment. This conversation sets the tone for ongoing dialogue with families. 
 
Your DFX evaluation team will gather a lot of information and data during psychological evaluations and will prepare a comprehensive report to share with your family. These reports generally include the information learned through the assessment process, any relevant diagnosis, and options for next steps. Recommendations may include specific interventions, like direct mental health therapy or medication, but also information about school accommodations or parenting resources.

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Identify Strengths

Evaluations help us understand how a child thinks, processes, and understands the world. Standardized assessments provide us with data on your child’s unique profile of strengths and challenges. From this, we can understand how to harness your child’s strengths to shore up areas that need support and determine outside accommodations or direct interventions that may assist them in developing new skills. 

What kind of evaluations are offered at DFX? 

boy in a sling having occupational therapy

Occupational therapy evaluations allow us to discover a child’s strengths in many areas of daily living, including how well they perform the tasks, sensory integration, fine and gross motor skills, emotional regulation, and much more.​

Two therapists working with a patient

Speech-language evaluations will provide an in-depth description of the individual’s communication skills, identify and describe the nature of communication deficits, and inform treatment recommendations. Speech-language evaluations can stand alone, or incorporate other disciplines (e.g., psychology, occupational therapy) to gain a broader picture of development.

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Psychological evaluations can provide a complete picture of each one’s cognitive, social, emotional, learning, language, developmental, attentional, and executive functioning needs as well as inform a diagnosis if applicable. They are also an important tool in guiding treatment recommendations and providing a more in depth understanding of one’s thinking, learning, and processing style. They highlight an individual’s strengths and provide ideas on ways to use those strengths to support areas of weakness.

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Multidisciplinary evaluations provide the opportunity to consider communication deficits within the context of occupational therapy and psychology testing.

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