Maybe Deerhart is thinking of ASD being aspergers rather than standing for Autism Spectrum Disorder which is the same as saying a Pervasive Developmental Disorder....
PDD or ASD means the same... its an umbrella where there are 5 categories...
http://www.childbrain.com/pdd.shtml
Dr. Grossmann has provided this PDD/Autism section of our website as a clear and practical resource for patients and their families who live with one of the various forms of PDD:
http://www.childbrain.com/pddq1.shtml
What is PDD or autism?
PDD or pervasive developmental disorder is a behavioral disorder of speech, communication, social interaction, and repetitive type compulsive behavior. Autism is a form of PDD. There are five types of PDD's. The most commonly encountered are PDD NOS (pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified), childhood autism, and Asperger's syndrome. All these "different" conditions have common diagnostic and physiologic features but differ slightly by the specific diagnostic criteria. (See The DSMV IV criteria for autistic disorders).
http://www.childbrain.com/pddq4.shtml
A short review of the different PDD's
There are five types of PDD's.
This section will give general guidelines, providing a superficial understanding of the differences between these above-mentioned disorders. A better, more specific understanding of these disorders is given by the specific DSM IV criteria for each disorder.
Always presents before 36 months of age, these children may have some speech developmental and social interactive regression, usually around 18 months of age. The diagnosis of childhood autism must meet the specific DSM IV criteria and will therefore present with poor eye contact, pervasive ignoring, language delay, and other features. Per definition, these children will have a severe impairment in speech, communication, or social interaction. Many of them will be completely non-verbal and "in their own world."
These are kids with a form of autism that affects language less, yet there are difficulties with appropriate speech and communicative development. Mostly, however, these children have social interaction difficulties and impairments related to a restricted, repetitive, stereotype behavior. These kids may have very high IQ's, may do very well academically, have a superior memory for "unimportant" details, such as the birth dates of all baseball players, some historical or geographical trivia, yet they lack the skills to care for themselves and live independently. These individuals may talk repetitively about a certain topic without understanding that it may be boring to others. The "amount" of memory of these individuals is incredible and one may expect different degrees of impairments with Asperger's syndrome. This may involve more or less memory and more or less social communicative impairment with regards to being able to live independently. As long as a child or individual seems "different" or "odd" and has a thought process that doesn't fit the way everyone else thinks, yet shows some of the required autistic characteristics, Asperger's syndrome should be considered. Many people with this condition remain undiagnosed because of their ability to compensate with their memory or excellent academic abilities, yet they are considered by others to be "socially inept," "weird," "nerds," "bizarre," "eccentric," etc.
A typical example of a child with Asperger's syndrome would be that of a child who has some odd behaviors, poor eye contact, "sluggish" social interaction abilities, and an extreme interest in a central topic such as a washing machine. The child likes to sit and watch the washing machine door rotate, knows everything about it including its operative and professional manual and may spend hours perseverating about it. Such a child when he has a play date, may try to involve his "friend" in his most exciting interest (the washing machine) without realizing how boring it is to others and that will be the end of the play dates forever. This pattern may present itself in different degrees and circumstances, but the prinicipal is the same: the lack of the ability to understand how other people perceive what you do, say, or express with body language and facial expressions.
C. Childhood disintegrative disorder
These are kids who develop normally for the first 3 years of life. Later they seem to regress and develop some autistic features associated with a severe functional impairment. These children must be thoroughly evaluated for the possibility of the development of seizures, affecting the speech areas of the brain, or Landau Kleffner syndrome (acquired epileptiform aphrasia), where seizure activity "robs" the brain from previously acquired speech.
This affects only girls. These are girls who develop normally until 6 months of age and regress. Their regression is associated with microcephaly (small head). The head size seems to stop growing from 6 months and on, from the time of the observed regression. Recently a specific chromosomal marker (MEC-P-2) has been associated with this disorder and is now commercially available in some laboratories.
PDD NOS will present similarly to the kids who have autism (some people argue that these conditions should be combined as one), but will have a lesser degree of a severe impairment. These kids are more likely to be verbal and have some degree of verbal or non-verbal effective communication, yet they must have the autistic features (as per the DSM IV criteria) and a severe impairment in social interaction, communication, or repetitive stereotype behavior. This term is reserved for children with a severe impairment who do not fully qualify for any other autistic diagnosis, due to age of onset or combination of autistic features.
http://www.childbrain.com/pddq2.shtml
How is PDD or autism diagnosed?
The diagnosis of PDD is clinical, meaning "what you see is what you've got." One needs to meet specific diagnostic criteria for the different conditions, but the general requirements are that one must have symptoms that belong to the three main areas of impairments:
These symptoms coupled with a severe impairment in speech, social skills, or repetitive stereotyped behavior qualifies one for PDD NOS in the milder situations and for the other autistic conditions in the more severe presentations.
At times, especially when diagnosed early, it may be difficult to predict what the final outcome will be. Even though PDD's are life long disorders, some children will do better than others and a small proportion may "outgrow" some of the difficulties. Subtle changes, however, persist universally, even in the best of situations throughout life, and involve mostly social interaction skills and some obsessive-compulsive behaviors.
A simplified way of understanding the diagnosis of autism is looking at the PDD assessment scale questionnaire. In order to qualify for an autism diagnosis, one needs to have some behavioral features from each one of the three subgroups listed. This, of course, must be associated with a severe speech, social, or repetitive behavior impairment. A more comprehensive understanding of the condition and its diagnostic differentiation to the five different subgroups is provided by the DSM IV criteria for the autistic disorders.
See Michelle I knew you would come along and help us!!!
tammy
P.s. 715
I think you misunderstood my post, it doens't have to be diagnosed prior to age 3,but rather the onset has to be before age 3. An ASD diagnosis requires that there must not be any clinically significant general language delay at all and in Autism/pdd the onset of at least one area must be before age 3 (language, social interaction, or imaginative play) and there must be some delay in language (included the ability to use conversational language)
OK what??????? deerhart no offence but you are confusing me... and i wasn't that confused before. ASD i thought was Autism Spectrum Disorders .... PDD-NOS, Aspergers, CDD, Rhetts, and Autism. .... am I wrong about this???Tammy
[QUOTE=deerhart]
a componentof PDD is that the child must have a significant speech delay priorot age 3 (I beleive its age 3 may not be) where ASD has normal language development.
Now to confuse things even more, many times some people will change the diagnosis from PDD to ASD ifthe speech delay is rectified.
[/QUOTE]
I've never heard of such a thing. My dd has mild pdd and her language developement is delayed a bit but not much. Just the way she uses words, mainly. My dh is hfa and his language was much more delayed.
I'm still confused about what my dd's pediatrician said regarding my dd's behavior. She said dd "definitely wasn't PDD" but then went on to talk about being on the "autism spectrum" and referred me to the neuro who we're seeing next week.
When I hear "definitely not PDD" I hear "NOT on the spectrum, period" because I thought PDD was an umbrella term for the 5 disorders and those disorder were what constituted "the spectrum". Right? Or not?
I'm confused about the term ASD or autism spectrum disorder. WHAT IS THAT???? Is that another word for PDD or is that specifically for the dx of autism, which then has it's own spectrum, the ASD?. Is that where high funtioning and low functioning autism disorders lie - on the ASD spectrum? Thanks for any help understanding all these labels.
No and there is a link somewhere on this discussion. ASD encompasses all autism spectrum disorders. Pdd is under the ASD. So is autism and aspergers. As with any of these diagnosis there is a varying degree of them. Here is a link http://www.autism-pdd.net/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=1147& ;KW=what+is+autism As with any developmental disability it is better to get a diagnosis from someone that has experience in this area than from someone that doesn't deal with it much.
Tammy
a componentof PDD is that the child must have a significant speech delay priorot age 3 (I beleive its age 3 may not be) where ASD has normal language development.
Now to confuse things even more, many times some people will change the diagnosis from PDD to ASD ifthe speech delay is rectified.
No not true. ASD can have delayed autism or pdd-nos too. With normal speech development up until the age of 3. They just don't like diagnosing it before the age of 3. Like Jeffrey was normal up until the age of 2 1/2 to 3. He was diagnosed with autism, pdd-nos.
Tammy
sorry brain fart I was thinking of Aspergers..
Hi. This is my first time on the boards here. I hope I am on the right board and am using proper "board etiquitte".
Christie,
There are several different ways to get a diagnosis in the spectrum for your child. Technically any doctor could do it but I would question whether they are qualified to make a decision like that unless they do diagnose it on a regular basis. I take it that by the doctor saying PDD he/she meant PDD-NOS which is the proper term. As you have already probably read earlier in this post the term PDD refers to many different spectrum disorders. PDD-NOS is a "type" of PDD. This doctor obviously feels that your child is on the spectrum. Now I would question that doctor why they feel that way and what tests they used to come to the conclusion. He should have used the DSM-IV to be able to pin-point exactly where on the spectrum your child is. The reason I mention this is if your child gets a diagnosis of PDD-NOS and is actually autistic then your child may not qualify for certain things depending on the state. Things that your child may need. I think it is a good idea to make that appt with the developmental pediatrician. They tend to deal with special needs more than a regular pediatrician and will probably be able to pin-point exactly what your dealing with here. Oh by the way...WELCOME TO THE BOARD!! I'm Karrie and I have 3 children and am due in august with my fourth. My 3 year old has PDD-NOS. Take care,
Karrie
Hi Christie! Welcome to the board. I have a 25mth old son who I am in the process of evaluating. (whenever they get back to me that is lol) He has been waking at night throwing tantrums as well, though not quite as violent as your son. My heart goes out to you. It must be very hard to deal with. I am thinking my son is just having night terrors as well. He does bite himself often, but he has yet to injure himself seriously (no blood). He has so many symptoms that seem to be on the spectrum, but other times he seems "normal" as well. It's definitely a complicated disorder and I'm in the same place as you appear to be. It's nice to find others.
Amber
I agree with karjab30. Unfortunately, many peds and docs today are saying PDD when the correct term is PDD-NOS. PDD IS an umbrella in which all these categories fall under.
Please see this sight, hopefully it will help ease some of the confusion!
http://nimh.nih.gov/publicat/autism.cfm
Hi,
Just noticed that the website I just gave isn't responding. (?)
Try this (it's the website to the National Institute of Mental Health.) Once there, just go to the right of the page and click on Autism Spectrum Disorders.
I agree with Karrie. Get an appointment with a developmental pediatrician and/or a neuro. And not just any neuro. Get an appointment with a neuro that is specifically in this area and has experience in diagnosing this. I know with Gabe his doctor thought he might have asthma but wasn't for sure so she referred him to a children's lung specialist. And he is the one that dx'ed him with asthma.
Jaggersmommy that is great that your insurance paid for your trip to that clinic. I know in my case it never would. It is out of the community care network, it is not an emergency, and I could never state having the child evaluated there was an emergency. Also keep in mind alot of these parents on this board are on fixed incomes, or very tight incomes.
Tammy
Unfortunately, while I live in the NYC area...my insurance does not cover such things. I think that this is a major problem for many middle class families who do have insurance. The cost for therapies (other than those supplied by local boards of education) are left to be paid fully by the parents, as many insurance companies do not cover therapies for developmental delays, autism, etc. This leaves many people with only the services they receive through their school districts. It really makes me angry!
push over buddy, i'm in your boat. because connor receives ot and st at school, insurance won't cover any additional time of therapy. it's infuriating. we end up doing alot on our own at home, we talk to his ot regularly, she gives us suggestions and we implement them ourselves. it kills me that we pay so much $$$ for the insurance but when we need it, they refuse to pay. bastards.
715
I don't know if this will help...but I've now been through 5 'specialty clinics' in the last few weeks that won't take our insurance...ridiculous. Haven't found one yet that would. I had a conversation with our ped about it, and he is planning to rewrite the referral so that it is for a "medical" need and not a "mental" need which is normally why insurance won't cover...and he says he'll make it for a Neuro as opposed to Psychologist.I have a daughter,4, with SEVERE speech delay. She is basically non verbal and she was diagnosed with ASD. I thought for sure the diagnosis would be PDD because her other "symptoms" are so mild but no, it's ASD for sure. This came from one of the best Autism clinics in the country so I have faith that the diagnosis is correct. So, you can absolutely have speech delay prior to age 3 or after and have a full Autism diagnosis unfortunately.
On the insurance front, GOOD LUCK! I'm not generally a big Michael Moore fan but those of you who are parents of an Autistic child will totally get his latest movie"Sicko". It's about how utterly ridiculous our insurance process is. Maybe one day I won't be told by the insurance Co. that my almost 5 year old daughter doesn't need speech therapy because she'll just "grow out of it". "It" being the severe speech delay that makes her non verbal except for Mama and Dada. They do not cover one cent of her speech therapy, three times a week, 9 per session. Really, they should all just be ashamed.
OKAY - I want to just clear this up once and for all on this post.
PDD is an umbrella term which stands for Pervasive Developmental Disorders. This is the umbrella term currently used by the DSM-IV TR, which is the diagnostic tool used by psychologists and psychiatrists to diagnose and code mental and neurological disorders.
PDD-NOS is under that umbrella along with 4 other categories: Asperger's Syndrome, Rett's disorder, Childhood Disintegrative Disorder, and autism (classic).
ASD is a term that stands for Autism Spectrum Disorder. There has been much talk that the next version of the DSM will not have PDD as the umbrella category name and will replace it with Autism Spectrum Disorder instead. So, a lot of people have just been using the term ASD - it seems to better describe the disorder and also lets people know that autism is a spectrum - a wide range of abilities and challenges.
Hope this helps!