As independent clinicians, we reserve the right to decline a referral where we feel necessary.
Unless we judge there to be exceptional circumstances, we will not assess the same person twice for the purposes of re-evaluating their symptomology relative to a baseline.
Any agreement to accept a referral is based on our capacity at the time of referral. We cannot guarantee that waiting times or acceptance criteria will remain the same if the referral is delayed.
We do not guarantee that our assessment will recommend a diagnosis of autism or ADHD, however, whatever the outcome, you will gain a profile of the individual’s strengths and areas of need.
We assume that on booking an appointment for children, where parents are separated, both are in agreement about the need for assessment and supportive of the process. If both parents are involved in the assessment, then they would need to be able to provide a shared account of the child’s development and present difficulties. We may not be able to conclude assessments where parental disagreement interferes with the assessment process.
Similarly, we would ask that parents of children who are over 14 years old and are Gillick competent ensure that they have consented to the process of assessment before booking. The clinicians will obtain consent before going ahead with the assessment on the day and if consent is not given this will be treated as a cancellation.
Our independent reports are usually ‘accepted’ by bodies such as schools, Local Authorities, LEAs, the CPS, individual employers and NHS Trusts. However, we are not in a position to guarantee this, as we have no control over it.
Our assessments are conducted bearing in mind NICE guidelines (for the NHS) and we always ensure that clinicians from more than one discipline undertake each autism assessment. This will always include a clinical psychologist and a speech and language therapist and may also include an occupational therapist or paediatrician.
All our clinicians are registered with the HCPC/GMC and their own professional bodies.
We will not recommend any assessment, diagnosis or intervention unless we believe that this is the appropriate course of action for the person involved. We work with honesty and integrity.
The total cost of any assessment services would be provided in writing in advance of any appointment with clinicians from Spectrum North West. There will be no change to this cost unless additional services are commissioned.
The cost of each assessment is calculated by taking into account the specific assessment tools required; the amount of time required for the clinicians to undertake the assessment and write up reports/letters; use of clinic rooms and associated costs; and any travel costs incurred.
We mainly conduct assessments for autism spectrum disorder, but we can also conduct assessments for ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), psychological wellbeing and other associated needs including cognitive functioning (IQ), speech and language (SALT) and sensory processing (OT). All of these assessments are conducted as separate, stand-alone assessments and are therefore charged separately.
Clients will not be charged for travel/mileage within a twenty-mile radius of Warrington, Cheshire.
Assessment will always include the use of standardised assessment tools, clinical interview and observation. We may recommend other assessments that will give more detailed information. Prices for different options will be given at the outset.
Where possible, assessment would take place in our clinic but in exceptional circumstances we may conduct assessments in a client’s home, solicitor’s office or place of employment. We may sometimes complete developmental histories via video link if needed, but we would never conduct direct assessments via video, e.g. ADOS or psychometric testing.
Upon booking an appointment, a deposit of £200 is payable. This reserves the appointment and is non-refundable unless 14 days’ notice of cancellation is given.
Final payment for private clients should be paid in full by BACS transfer at least two weeks prior to the first appointment or can be paid in full at the time of booking if the appointment falls within the following fourteen days.
We require payment by bank transfer (BACS) or in some circumstances cash. We do not accept cheques and have no facility to accept cards.
In the event that the final balance is still not paid two working days before the appointment, we reserve the right to offer your appointment to another client if we are unable to contact you by whatever means of contact you have supplied when booking.
Payment for medico-legal work by insurance companies/solicitors would be strictly within 28 days of receipt of invoice. For other organisations (e.g. the police, educational establishments, NHS commissioners) we require payment in advance of the assessment taking place. We will not book or undertake any assessment until we receive confirmation of funding from an organisation in writing. The assessment report will be released on receipt of payment.
For referrals from organisations who are data controllers and who already hold personal and sensitive data about the client, we assume that organisation will hold the copy of the client’s report once complete and continue to be data controller in that instance. We will delete all data following the assessment and will not deal with any subsequent Subject Access Requests for that client under the Data Protection Act (2018).
We are very happy to receive copies of relevant previous reports as background information for assessment (e.g. Psychology, Paediatrician, Psychiatrist, SALT, OT, schools), however where only original copies are available, we cannot take responsibility for their safe return. All originals will be sent back via Royal Mail. It is therefore preferable to receive scans or photocopies of originals.
We kindly ask clients not to send any post via ‘signed for’ delivery, as we do not employ full time admin staff, and therefore it is possible that the delivery will arrive when staff are not present and the clinic is locked. This leads to documents being returned to the central sorting office, which we cannot always access in time for the assessment.
We ask for any questionnaires and forms to be completed prior to the assessment where possible, otherwise this may delay completion of your assessment report. We cannot accept questionnaires and forms if they are sent over one month after the final assessment date, as the report will already have been completed.
We do not routinely communicate by text message unless specifically arranged. Clients sending texts messages to the Spectrum telephone cannot be guaranteed a timely response and email is the best way of contacting our admin team. If you do need to use the telephone, please be aware that our admin team works part time and may not answer – please leave a message if you need to and someone will call you back.
Where unforeseen circumstances mean that a full assessment could not be completed (e.g. engagement of various parties/ unexpected illness) we would confirm a reduced fee for the work carried out to date and refund any payment due.
Cancellation within the 14 days prior to the appointment date will incur a fee of 50% of the agreed price unless we have been able to allocate your appointment to another client.
If postponement is made within 48 hours due to unforeseen circumstances (e.g. illness, travel disruption on the part of the client) then the appointment will be rescheduled providing that we are satisfied that the reason is genuine, however any costs incurred by the clinician (e.g. consulting room rental) is payable by the client.
We will not accept a second postponement of any appointment and will treat this as a cancellation.
If a child or young person is unable to engage with an assessment due to dysregulation on the day, the clinicians will work in collaboration with parents/carers to support this; this will include discussion about how the assessment or part of the assessment would best be completed.
Where clinicians are forced to cancel an appointment, as much notice as possible will be given and the appointment will be rescheduled at the earliest opportunity. In this case, there would be no additional cost to the client, and any costs incurred would be borne by the clinicians.
We are happy to work alongside existing services with the client’s consent, e.g. NHS, social services, legal teams, charitable organisations or education systems.
We would recommend that if you wish to continue to use or work alongside your own local services, e.g. NHS, that you inform them in advance that you are seeking independent assessment, that you/we will be providing them with a copy of our report and that you check in advance that they are willing to take on board any recommendations therein.
All assessment would be strictly confidential. However, in the case of any safeguarding concerns, i.e. where we feel there are any concerns about risk to the client or to others, we would advise the client/family of this and where possible discuss and agree how to proceed. On the rare occasions where we feel the client or parents do not have capacity to understand the risks or issues involved, we would make a safeguarding referral and would always inform the client of this.
We would respectfully request that any parent referring a child to our services does so in consultation with any other individual who has parental responsibility for that child. We cannot accept responsibility for this, and will not become involved in disputes between parents.
Any paper notes kept will be stored securely by the clinicians in a locked cupboard/cabinet and will be destroyed once the child reaches the age of 25.
Electronic records (which will include your final report and any scanned assessments) will be encrypted to ensure that your data is protected.
Any video tapes of assessments are for our own use and will be used to watch and score the ADOS assessment. Afterwards, these will be erased immediately from hardware (ie, the camera and our computers) after they have been viewed.
By agreeing to our terms and conditions, you are agreeing to the videotaping of the ADOS session (for Autism assessment only).
The scoring and discussions relating to the formal assessments remain the clinical opinion of the trained clinicians and therefore cannot be subject to amendments by others. The report must remain the work and opinion of the clinicians involved, and though we will take on board comments, we will not make claims or comments that we cannot substantiate from our own observation.
Similarly, we will not change our clinical opinion based on the work of other professionals. Our opinion is based on the findings of our own assessment.
The scope of our service is limited to assessment, diagnosis (if any) and recommendations. We do offer post-diagnostic services (costed separately) and these can be discussed during your appointment.
Our recommendations will be broad and are not intended to replace intervention. Our primary purpose is to diagnose the presence or absence of autism/ADHD and to signpost our clients if required. The diagnostic report will give recommendations designed to help and improve the well-being of the client but these are not intended to be exhaustive and clients or carers may wish to seek further professional support in addressing issues highlighted during the diagnostic process.
Our involvement ends when the final report has been completed, though we are happy to answer any queries about our work. We do not offer follow-up intervention unless agreed or commissioned separately.
We reserve the right to decline follow-up intervention. We recommend that clients and/or carers and parents seek post-diagnostic support as appropriate. This may include help to come to terms with any diagnosis that is given.
We do not routinely engage in post-diagnostic EHCP applications or form filling unless these have been specifically commissioned by the client/family. However, we are of course happy for our reports to be used as evidence.
We have a Facebook parents’/carers’ group for families of children we have diagnosed with autism – invitation to this group is at our discretion.
We assume that clients understand that there are certain risks associated with attending our clinic and we will not take responsibility for any illness or need for quarantine that occurs as a result of this.
On booking an appointment we assume that clients have read and agree to our terms and conditions. It is therefore the responsibility of the client to ensure that they have read the information that we have sent to them.
