The assessment for Autism Spectrum Disorders that we employ (the “AAA assessment”) involves a comprehensive psychosocial clinical interview with the patient and an informant, and the use of ASD specific rating scales and questionnaires including the Autistic Quotient scale (AQ); Emotional Quotient scale (EQ); RQ (CAST-revised); AAA; Patient Questionnaire (PQ). Moreover, we will look at possible conditions that might mimic ASD symptoms and to symptoms that might be a sign of the existence of conditions that might co-exist with ASD (e.g. ADHD). In general, the assessment will take a minimum of 2 hours, very often more. After the assessment, we will review the data and write a full report with the diagnostic conclusions and recommendations. During the assessment, an informant who knew the client as a child must be present as there will be important questions regarding early childhood (before age 6).
The AAA assessment is the gold standard for assessing ASD in adults (in particular, Asperger’s syndrome, high functioning autism).
For ASD, pharmacological intervention is not the first choice, psychological therapies are shown to be effective in addressing the core symptoms of ASD. However, if other conditions co-exists (e.g. anxiety, depressive disorder) then medication treatment might be a appropriate.
In recent years, mindfulness based CBT has been showed to improve attention, reduce stress, and improve mood. Studies examining the efficacy of mindfulness based cognitive therapy show improvements in ADHD symptoms and performance on neuropsychological tasks measuring attention and impulsivity. Improvements in anxiety and depressive symptoms were also observed.
This approach has the aim to improve individuals’ ability to grasp social cues and, as a consequence, improve social functioning. Indeed, one problem central to individuals with autism is impaired social cognitive functioning. These social impairments encompass basic emotion recognition (reading specific emotions from human faces), theory of mind deficits (inferring intentions and beliefs in others and themselves) and other social cues (e.g. vocal tone), significantly affecting the lives of people with ASD and their families. The training employed here will focus in enhancing emotion recognition using external cues, role playing, facial emotion and prosody/vocal tone/body language recognition training tasks.
Research evidence also shows treatment effect when employing an integrative treatment approach based on cognitive behavioural (CBT), systemic paradigms, and attachment theories. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) has also shown promising results.
Couples where one of the members suffers from ADHD (with or without ASD) commonly experience significant problems and conflicts in several domains including: chore-sharing, finance management and planning, sexual intimacy, communications, child-rearing style, anger outbursts, just to name a few. Integrating several techniques from psychoeducation, systemic theory, mindfulness and CBT approaches, we will be able to foster understanding, change and wellbeing. Some examples of what kind of change you should expect:
In sum, adults with ADHD will be able to act more mindfully, with more insight and be able to develop new healthier habits and being more emotionally connected with their loved ones.