What Happens Next
What Happens When I Book An Appointment?
You will be asked to fill out a couple of short screening questionnaires:
This helps us to see how impairing your symptoms you are. It gives us information about how you are feeling about your symptoms and whether there are any other issues that we might need to pay special attention to.
You will then receive a link for your video assessment.
This confirms the date and time of your appointment, your appointment usually takes about an hour to an hour and a half. You can click on the link and access the appointment through your browser or your phone.
What happens at the appointment?
We will check your ID online and may ask you for your Driving Licence, Passport, or another form of Identification if you are under 16. The appointment takes the form of a semi structured interview and uses NICE Guidelines Clinical Assessment Tools. These questions are not right, or wrong answers and you are not being tested. You will self-report from memory, symptoms and events that have happened in your adult life and your childhood. An Example question: How are you at reading a book to the end?
What results are available to me?
You will get your diagnostic result at the end of your appointment, a full written report arrives up to 2 weeks later and a copy report is sent to your General Practitioner.
Should I take medication?
You will have time after the test to discuss what your options are, some people prefer to start on medication at the time of the appointment, as they may have been waiting a while or generally need to improve their symptoms more quickly. Once this is discussed, a prescription is written for you to obtain the medication that is the best fit for your symptoms.
How will I be monitored?
You will have a follow up appointment every three weeks and you are given an email address to send urgent medication issues to and this is monitored daily.
What happens at my follow up appointments?
The first part of the appointment looks at your physical health and how medication is helping and improving your symptoms. The second part of the appointment looks at the ways we can implement non-medical treatment to improve your symptoms. We will look at particular problem areas that are specific to you. You will receive coaching for 6 sessions as part of your treatment plan and these are at no extra cost. This is a service that we provide to all newly diagnosed patients and it is free.
Do I have to pay for my medication?
While you are a private patient, you will need to pay for the cost of your medicines, we allow you to choose your pharmacy and we do not charge for the cost of the private prescription or the registered post to get it to you. We have no control over private medicine charges they are set by tariff. When you are on the correct dose of medicine that treats your symptoms and we can demonstrate that you have improved, we then right to your family doctor with this evidence and ask them to take over the prescribing of your medication.
How do you demonstrate that I have improved?
We do this by re-testing via the correct screening tools and showing that you now have proven improvement when compared with your screening results before your treatment started.
How long can I stay on medication?
There is no limit to the time you can safely stay on medication, medication taken at the right dose, is clinically proven to be effective. However, there are times that you may wish to stop your medications, either temporarily or long term. This is why we take treatment very seriously and always back up our treatment with sessions to improve the underlying causes. This is achieved through, Counselling, Psychotherapy, Coaching and The Executive Skills Course. We believe strongly that ‘pills don’t make skills’ and every opportunity to improve on your own ability to address your symptoms, should be offered to you.
How does coaching help?
Coaching is an excellent way to improve your Executive Function Skills, these skills are the most impaired by Neurodiversity. The Coaching Programme – can be one session or twenty one sessions, it is driven by you and by your needs. These appointments take place online and are best set up as an hour session. You can opt for a half hour telephone coaching session and we have a texting service that allows you to message your coach, as a direct contact. Our best advice is try a session and we think you will be pleasantly surprised by what you can achieve.
How do educational courses help me improve?
The course is set at your own pace and sessions purchased can be individual, if you know that Time Management – is a particular problem that was highlighted at your assessment, then you can choose just that module. The Module looks at the problems you might be having, there are questionnaires that help you pin-point the cause of the problem. There are strategies to improve or strategies to modify the environment that the problem occurs in. Improvements are measured as you test out your new skills. Some of the leading names in Neurodiversity inform our course material and the strategies you will learn are tried and tested.
What medications will I be offered?
Medication has moved on since the old days of a short acting stimulant. These were difficult to manage, due to the peaks and troughs in their performance. Now, there are long-acting slow-release medications available. These are safe and are usually metabolised within 24 hours, so there is no addiction to these tablets. Stimulant have been proven to improve ADHD symptoms by up to 90%. The medications we use sometimes cause weight loss or a dry mouth – the benefits of medication for someone who has symptoms that are disrupting their daily life, far exceed these side effects. Non-Stimulants are also now available and have shown some real promise for patients that are unable to take a stimulant medication.
As private providers of treatment we do not use cheaper alternative medicines as our best treatment plan. We aim for best treatment fit per person with the most tried and tested medications.