Quote:
Originally Posted by kepp
Where did you learn about these symptoms?
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Hi,
A good INITIAL ROUGH screening tool that lists SOME of the behaviors seen in young children that MAY have autistic symptoms, AND that you can get online is the M-CHAT, or CHecklist for Autism in Toddlers (Modified). You can read about it at
http://www.firstsigns.org/screening/tools/rec.htm
You can even download it, and this site also gives scoring instructions.
I have to STRONGLY CAUTION *ANYONE* against using this tool ALONE to diagnose autism. This is a screening checklist: it is DESIGNED to err on the side of having the child "fail" if there is any reasonable risk factors seen. The POINT of this kind of tool is to allow nurses, early childhood professionals and even lay people to run the screen, then send a child that fails to a SPECIALIST, who may or MAY NOT confirm that the child has autism OR another developmental delay.
So PLEASE do NOT run the test on your child or a friend's child and declare the kid autistic, because the child MAY WELL NOT BE. If they fail the screening tool, it ONLY means that there are SOME suspicious behaviors that should be looked at by a professional neurologist. This is NOT a *hard diagnostic test*, okay???