Assessment for attachment, cognitive, behavioral, or emotional struggles usually occurs with a licensed psychologist, neuropsychologist, psychiatrist, or neurologist, depending on the need. Assessment may be covered by insurance. Ask your provider for pre-authorization to find out.

• Psychologists and psychiatrists often use interviews with parents and children, as well as computer-based assessments, to obtain measurements and compare them to a general population norm. The diagnostic process can take several meetings.

• Licensed therapists are often trained to be hesitant to diagnose beyond basic problems such as anxiety and depression. Certain diagnoses, such as ADHD and Bipolar Disorder, require additional assessment by a licensed physician in order to rule out potential hormonal or medical contributing factors.

• Ask your child's therapist if they have training in assessment and are able to screen for various problems using well-known and accepted screening assessments.

• A licensed therapist may be a good first step toward obtaining diagnoses, as therapists will be able to provide several hours for initial assessment while informally observing behaviors. Once initial assessment is completed, your child's therapist may refer your child for full psychological or neurological assessment with a psychiatrist, educational testing, or other medical professional. 

Family Assessments

• For children and teenagers, a licensed Marriage & Family Therapist (LMFT; COAMFTE) or Marriage, Couple & Family Counselor (LPC, MCFC; CACREP) may be equipped to assess parenting and family dynamics and their contributing role in your child's struggles.

What If My Child is Unwilling to Participate in Assessments?

• If your child is unwilling to be assessed, then the next best step may be taking them to a local psychiatric unit for evaluation. Most  psychiatric hospitals can handle acute cases, diagnose, and provide appropriate medication in a short period of time. If possible, be ready with a plan to place your child in longer-term care when necessary.

• Residential treatment centers, wilderness therapy programs, and therapeutic boarding schools  may be able to provide psychological assessment on campus or with their consulting psychologist. Some programs may provide neurological and medical assessments.  However, some programs require all records and assessments be completed well-before placement in their program, and base their decision to accept on prior formal assessments.  

What is the Value of Diagnosis?

Many parents express fear that a diagnosis will label their child in a negative light or allow their child to 'play the victim' in their struggles. Diagnosis can induce a sense of shame in families and individuals who exist in cultures that do not appreciate difference, ridicule appearances of weakness, or devalue the struggles of being human.

1. Diagnosis should be the result of many perspectives. Diagnosis requires specific training, experience, and consensus across multiple inputs, not just a single clinician's or doctor's perspective. Be willing to seek second, third, and fourth opinions.

2. Diagnosis provides caregivers the basis to understand. Children are not their diagnoses, and with few exceptions, the struggles of their diagnoses do not reflect on their parents or family. Destructive behavior is often an outward expression of unresolved inward pain, such as anxiety, depression, loneliness, overwhelming boredom, emptiness, or shame. Understanding the root of a child's pain, and allowing for differences, and adjusting expectations as caregivers are the first steps toward positive change.

3. Diagnosis helps professionals understand and communicate core concerns to one another. The helping community develops  evidence-based treatments to alleviate unnecessary suffering by identifying clusters of symptoms and giving them a name. Some diagnoses are genetically-inherited differences related to brain growth and development, which may be helped by mood stabilizers, or anti-psychotic medications. Other diagnoses become more apparent over time as a combination of stress and genetic predisposition, such as addictions, anxiety disorders, panic disorders, eating disorders, or PTSD.

4. Diagnosis helps professionals target intervention. Each diagnosis requires specialized training and intervention. Most well-seasoned helping professionals understand the need for a multi-layered approach to help.