An evaluation should do more than produce a label. It should help you understand the person’s strengths, needs, access barriers, and useful next steps.
The right evaluator depends on the question. A medical diagnosis, school eligibility decision, and therapy evaluation are related—but they are not interchangeable.
Answers whether a person meets diagnostic criteria for autism, ADHD, a mental-health condition, or another health condition. Diagnosis authority depends on the professional’s license, training, state law, setting, and sometimes payer rules.
Answers whether a student qualifies for special-education services under an educational category and what school supports are needed. A medical diagnosis does not automatically create an IEP, and a school eligibility decision is not always a medical diagnosis.
Answers whether speech-language, occupational, physical, feeding, or another therapy is needed. Therapists diagnose and document problems within their own discipline; they do not automatically diagnose the underlying medical or developmental condition.
An interdisciplinary evaluation is especially valuable when several explanations may overlap.
Autism evaluations should consider development, communication, sensory and movement differences, play or interests, relationships, adaptive functioning, health history, and behavior across more than one context. No single score should tell the whole story.
SLPs have an important role in autism screening, assessment, and diagnosis. Whether an SLP diagnoses independently depends on state law, competence, setting, and payer requirements. Not every SLP—or psychologist, physician, or counselor—has current autism-evaluation expertise.
Ask how the evaluator recognizes less stereotypical presentations, masking, AAC use, intellectual disability, language differences, and co-occurring conditions.
A strong ADHD evaluation uses developmental and medical history, information from more than one setting, interviews or rating scales, and consideration of sleep, anxiety, trauma, learning, language, sensory needs, medication, and other explanations. A computerized attention test alone is not a complete evaluation.
Ask who makes the diagnosis, whether that clinician can discuss medication if desired, and how recommendations will translate into home, school, work, or daily life.
Dyslexia is a written-language disorder involving word reading and spelling. SLPs’ scope includes spoken and written language, but comprehensive evaluation may also involve psychology, education, and the school team.
Ask whether testing covers phonological processing, decoding, spelling, reading fluency and comprehension, oral language, writing, and the person’s educational history. Also ask whether the report will meet the requirements of the school, college, testing agency, or funding source that needs it.
Scope and licensing rules can change. These guides were researched for Tennessee in September 2026; always verify a provider’s current license and ask whether they regularly treat your child’s specific need.
