NHS cannot meet autism or ADHD demand, report says

The extraordinary rise in demand for autism assessments and ADHD treatments in England has overtaken the NHS's capacity to meet it, a think tank says.

Since 2019, there has been a five-fold rise in people waiting to see an autism specialist and a 51% increase in prescriptions for ADHD medication, according to the Nuffield Trust.

Growing backlogs and longer waiting times are negatively impacting people's daily lives, it warned.

There’s more on the story here: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-68725973

Reply 1

ROTL 94

13

And how many of these people actually have autism? Unsustainable.

OP

Original post by ROTL 94

And how many of these people actually have autism? Unsustainable.

Unpopular opinion from me was wondering this as well.

I see so many people online suspect that they have ADHD simply because they get easily distracted (nothing else it seems).

And people thinking that they have Autism simply because they are a bit quirky (they don’t fit the norms of society when it comes to things in general e.g gender, social interactions, clothing style etc). Or people online and IRL saying that “everyone is a bit autistic”.

Essentially boiling the disabilities down to one trait when they are much more complex than this.

Reply 3

Jess_Lomas

17

I've always wondered this
I had my NHS assessment a year ago and was diagnoised with ASD,
I've always just wondered how many people who have the assessment go onto getting the formal diagnosis.
I don't know how well it would work if they had a small team that gave like an inital assessment early on in the process that decides if they should be refered for a full assessment to help keep the waiting times down

Reply 4

Admit-One

Universities Forum Helper

21

I don't think this is any surprise to anyone that has tried to get an assesment for ADHD.

Reply 5

Jess_Lomas

17

Also from my experience the ASD assessments take 3-5 years which is longer than they are admitting to in the BBC post
But that's just from the people that I've spoken to

It took me almost 2 years to get an autism diagnosis, I was waiting 6 months for an initial appointment, I waited 8 months for an ADOS assessment after that (which was then postponed because of the queen's funeral) so I then had to wait another month after that, and then I had to wait another month to actually receive a diagnosis.

It doesn't surprise me honestly, and I know many others have had to wait longer. Most of the people I know went private because it was so difficult to get a diagnosis on the NHS.

Original post by Jess_Lomas

I've always wondered this
I had my NHS assessment a year ago and was diagnoised with ASD,
I've always just wondered how many people who have the assessment go onto getting the formal diagnosis.
I don't know how well it would work if they had a small team that gave like an inital assessment early on in the process that decides if they should be refered for a full assessment to help keep the waiting times down

I had to have an initial assessment before going on to the ADOS assessment, and I do wonder how many people who reach that stage actually are allowed an assessment. Also, they try to weed out people by saying that if you don't respond to forms within two weeks they will not give you an appointment (this was children's assessments admittedly, I don't really know how adults' assessments work)