Assessment is an important and central process to therapy that is woven into Specialist Behaviour Support and Counselling Psychotherapy. Assessment is the process of coming to understand a person’s presentation, capacities, and abilities. Within this, we also appreciate a person’s functional capacities and limitations, and how a person may present with various disabilities or conditions.
We provide a wide range of tests and assessments during therapy. Usually, in the majority of cases, we conduct these specific assessments within the flow of a therapeutic relationship or case review. For NDIS participants, these assessments do not usually attach additional fees or charges. We see this process as central and woven into the service of providing a functional behavioural capacity review and report.
The functional capacity report always comes before a behaviour support plan. This is a comprehensive review, and assessment is simply so central to this process that it cannot be separated out. In this way we may differ from many other providers who may bill additional fees for assessments.
During every session within our work with people, we write clinical notes that record our observations and insights of what we accomplished in the time. In a way, these notes reflect an assessment process as well. Central to our current practice is also providing a Comprehensive Risk Assessment for all of our cases that we do internally once we get to know the person and their circumstances. Risk assessments are now central to the Quality and Safeguarding Standards within the NDIS Commission’s reviews over the past few years.
There are many other types of assessments we may engage. It is always a bit dangerous to list these because these things usually change over time. What one person needs is different from another. But anyway, the list is interesting nonetheless…
Here are a few common assessment tools that we have been using recently.
| Adaptive Behaviour Assessment System Edition 3 (ABAS III) | The ABAS III can contribute toward diagnosis and treatment planning with Autism Spectrum Disorder, Intellectual Disabilities, and Developmental Disabilities. |
| GARS-3 | The Gilliam Autism Rating Scale – Third Edition |
| ADOS-2 | The Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule – Edition Two |
| HAM-A | The Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale |
| GAD-7 | Generalised Anxiety Disorder 7-item Scale |
| SMGA | Severity Measure for Generalised Anxiety Disorder – Adult |
| DASS 21 | Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale |
| PHQ-9 | Patient Health Questionnaire |
