Confirming an existing diagnosis

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Hi all.

I have somewhat recently been diagnosed with autism by a clinical psychologist, trough one of the few existing services for this purpose.

Because I was, like all other patients, self-referred, I fear this could lead to a positive confirmation bias, since that is also what may be expected to lead to having more clients in the future.

I don't think this makes the process entirely unreliable, just potentially biased, so I was considering confirming the diagnosis in a similar way, with some other party. I have, however, been unable to find any service for this purpose.

My goal would be to confirm the evaluation without having to repeat the whole process (on the basis of the information that has already been gathered, including also a mapping document with DSM 5 criteria).
Does anyone know of any available solution for this?

Thank you in advance.

It would seem unlikely to me that a diagnostician would deliberately give a false positive diagnosis for ASD to get more customers, unless you appeared to want the result to be positive, and as you're skeptical about the result, that would suggest you just wanted to know the truth. But that's just my "educated guess." The DX isn't an exact science so there's likely to be a bit of error in it, but apart from borderline cases I doubt it's likely to be enough on its own to tip the balance. If you're well above the diagnostic threshold and the diagnostician was reasonably competent, the result probably is what it says.

If you're familiar with and understand the diagnostic criteria, then you could try reading that and seeing how the criteria match up to what you know about yourself. The Aspie-Quiz, though it doesn't claim to be a clinical diagnostic tool, might also be worth taking. I prefer it to the AQ test because it's rather less reductionist and has a lot more questions. As well as an overall score, it also gives you a profile of your different traits, which might at least give you an insight into a lot of different facets of yourself, which may be useful whether or not you technically have ASD.

https://rdos.net/eng/Aspie-quiz.php

I always prefer to focus on my traits rather than the yes-or-no approach to ASD because ASD expresses rather differently in each individual. So I'm more interested in my objective strengths and weaknesses than the more subjective notion of my ASD as a single parameter, though I don't much doubt that I have it, because so many things in my life became clearer after being given a positive DX.

It's probably natural and healthy to remain at least a little open-minded about any test or diagnostic procedure that involves a lot of question-and-answer and self-assessment, because (I think) most people don't know themselves perfectly. But I think it's rare for people to falsely claim weaknesses without any great hope of life-changing adjustments or benefits. So I don't see any possible motive for bias.

Just my opinions of course.

you might do the same thing with online self testing. There are many self tests available on line which may help define your diagnosis and confirm it. It is not unusual for us to question recent diagnosis, diagnosis changes our perspective on absolutely everything we thought we knew or understood up until now. For me it was a relief and an answer to so many painful "whys" of the past. Take your time to work it all out. Its a lot to sort!

Presumably you self-referred for a reason. If so, that suggests you already had reasons for suspicion.

Further researching the topic online can help you further assess whether the diagnosis makes sense.

And online tests can also provide informal confirmation. ToughDiamond already mentioned one. I'll mention AQ.

Thank you all for your answers.

To be clear, I have been self-diagnosed a long time before seeking a professional assessment.

I have done online test for Asperger's/autism before and they predominantly give positive result. But, of course, they are not diagnoses.

It wouldn't have to be deliberate. Rather, services with a tendency hire psychologists prone to positive bias will also, arguably, be more successful and thus be selected by the market over time.

That said, I did wish for a positive result more so than a negative one. I think it's a rather natural tendency for humans to prefer being right. For this reason, I was rather careful not to skew the result in this direction.

At the end of the assessment, she asked my own opinion about whether I was autistic. I essentially gave a non-answer and, when she asked again, I replied I was reluctant to give a proper answer because I didn't want that to affect her evaluation. She replied she had already formed a clinical opinion, but that she needed to know my own first before telling me. I answered positively, mentioning some reasons.

Later, some time after the diagnosis, I reached out again to ask the reason for this. Here is what she answered:



I thanked her for her answer.



Ok, but in this instance the binary approach is what I'm interested in because the claim I wish to verify is that my condition qualifies as clinical ASD.



In this case it didn't change my prospective in a significant way. It confirmed my prospective.
That's the point. That is the reason I wonder about the potential for confirmation bias.



Yes, I have had a rather strong suspicion.



I have researched the topic online many times before the process and, although I will continue to do so, it does make sense.
I referred to a professional to seek an external evaluation of whether my condition qualified as clinical ASD.
What I would, ideally, like to find, is an analogous service, but to get a second opinion on an existing diagnosis, taking advantage of the mapping document to avoid the time (and the cost) of a new evaluation from scratch.

It sounds reasonable to say welcome to the Spectrum!