Have you been told different reasons for your child’s struggles? Are you feeling confused about what’s going on and what direction to turn? Maybe you’ve experienced different behavioral health professionals diagnosing different problems. Life can start to feel like a guessing game. You might wonder how you’re supposed to treat something you don’t fully understand. What you know is that your child is struggling at home, in the community, at school. 

Diagnosing behavioral health disorders can be very challenging, particularly with young people. The fact that children and adolescents have brains that are developing presents issues with obtaining an accurate diagnosis. Quality psychological assessment has to take into account the developmental progression of the child. Children struggle with different emotions and behaviors in very different ways at various developmental levels. They are expected to know and be able to achieve different things in school based upon their grade level. 

Psychological assessment by a psychologist offers benefits for ongoing intervention. Psychologists use psychological tests in a similar manner to the way physicians use medical tests. Data is gathered to help identify the ways that a child processes information, makes decisions, and interacts with others. This information is considered by the psychologist in order to diagnose problems. Once problems are understood, an accurate diagnosis can be made. 

Obtaining the most accurate diagnosis possible is vital to treatment. This guides counseling, medication, and school interventions. This can also impact the recommendations for parents, families, educators, and medical professionals. Accurate diagnosis of problems leads to treatment that is effective. This is true in both medical and behavioral health settings. In behavioral health settings, getting an accurate diagnosis helps everyone to work toward similar goals. In the absence of an accurate diagnosis different people working with the child can be working in very different directions from different understandings of the problems. This serves to confuse the child and to confound progress. 

Sometimes children can receive multiple diagnoses for similar symptoms. This can lead to treatment that is not effective at all or is minimally effective. Often, multiple diagnoses are not necessary. It is important to describe symptoms using the fewest labels possible. When this occurs, treatment can be delivered in the most focused and efficient way possible.  

If you feel that your child’s treatment is not making the expected or desired progress, you might consider psychological assessment. Frequently, when treatment is not progressing as expected, there is an issue with understanding the problem.

Imagine everyone who works with your child understanding their challenges in a similar way. Consider how their treatment would look with reasonable and attainable goals. As a parent, you have an accurate understanding of what is going on and how to respond. Your child’s teacher “gets them” and knows how to focus them on the best educational goals possible. Other behavioral health providers who work with your child share similar goals that is based upon an in-depth understanding of their unique challenges. Progress can be seen that seemed impossible!

OUR PHILOSOPHY OF ASSESSMENT

Our philosophy of assessment at Groupworks is to be very thorough in our work. We treat each client individually and develop a plan of assessment that will answer the necessary questions. We gather data from multiple sources including the child, parents, and educators. This approach gives us the information we need to develop the best plan going forward. It is our goal for each assessment to guide the path to recovery.

We emphasize the need to get an accurate diagnosis while minimizing the number of labels used. While there are often multiple factors that contribute to a child’s struggles, finding the core causes of these problems is important. We look for those underlying issues that can inform the best treatment possible. 

We are committed to the highest standards in psychological testing at Groupworks. We engage in ongoing training and utilize some of the most current and best assessments available to get the information we need. Thorough assessment yields the most accurate diagnosis. This is why we insist on gathering information from multiple sources in each of our assessments.

At Groupworks we believe that psychological assessment should provide impactful recommendations. Our reports offer a detailed description of the challenges facing the client and their family along with the resources that will help them recover.  The report that results from assessment will contain detailed recommendations for home, school, and social settings. This is how psychological assessment guides the path to effective treatment. 

THE VALUE OF PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSESSMENT

Effective treatment begins with an accurate diagnosis. Drs. Brian Belva and Tony Sheppard bring together expertise in psychiatric diagnosis and psychological testing to offer an accurate psychiatric diagnosis. Collectively, we have assessed hundreds of local youth over the past several years. This work has helped us hone our skills and kept us current with best practices in the area of psychological assessment. 

Some use the analogy of popular medical tests when talking about the usefulness of psychological assessment. Tests like X-Rays, MRI’s, and measures of vital statistics help physicians to better understand the causes of problems patients face. Similarly, psychological tests help us gain a deeper understanding of the problems people face.

Together with our Doctoral Students from the School of Professional Psychology at Spalding University, we offer valuable input to the treatment of our clients.

OUR ASSESSMENT TEAM

Dr. Sheppard has extensive experience in the assessment of trauma, depression, anxiety and behavioral concerns. Dr. Sheppard has conducted more than 600 psychological assessments throughout his career. He brings a passion for psychological assessment and extensive knowledge of diagnostics to all of his work.

Our Doctoral Students from the School of Professional Psychology at Spalding University offer reduced cost psychological testing. These assessments are supervised by Drs. Sheppard & Thieneman.

We are committed to the highest standards in psychological testing at Groupworks. We engage in ongoing training and utilize some of the most current and best assessments available to get the information we need. Thorough assessment yields the most accurate diagnosis. This is why we insist on gathering information from multiple sources in each of our assessments.