As advised by Dr. Juanita we made an appointment for a hearing test at Sunway Medical Centre since we are more familiar with the area (compared to Cheras).
The test was done at the Speech & Hearing Centre but I forgot to get the therapist's name. He was a young Indian male and he was very nice to our son. The most important thing is that he knows how to handle children well. Our son was happily following his instructions.
Centres like this has good tools to determine whether the child can hear the sounds being tested. By tools, I mean toys. During our session the therapist used marbles and instructed son to put in the marble into the structure if he hears the sound being played.
For children who can't respond I think they might have to plug in probes to look for brain activity. DO NOT take my word for this as I don't know. I only saw pictures of hearing tests that has a lot of wires to the child's head and I was really afraid they're going to do this to our son. Luckily, he is able to listen and respond.
The test was initiated with sounds playing on the speakers, but most of the tests afterwards were using headphones.
The good news? Our son's hearing is well and he passed all the tests.
If you need their service, please click on the link in the 2nd paragraph above.
- Abah
A little family of t̶h̶r̶e̶e̶ four in Malaysia, discovering life with Asperger syndrome, Autism, and Amblyopia. This is our little diary. This website is anonymously written by Abah (Abah is Dad in Malay) but if you try hard enough you can track our real personalities. Not that we want you to, we are simply asking that you not to try. This blog might look outdated from time to time while we deal with life...
Saturday, February 23, 2013
Child Specialist Visit at UKM Specialist Centre
It's been a while since I had the time to continue writing in this blog. Mainly because I had a new job, which is very challenging. Travel to work at 8.00AM and arrive back home at 9.00PM, sometimes 10.00PM. Enough about me.
We managed to secure the appointment with Prof Madya Dr. Raja Juanita Raja Lope at the UKM Specialist Centre and went there on the 26th of December 2012. Her specialty is Developmental Paediatrics.
The doctor is really nice, and we are very satisfied with the diagnosis session. She had a lot of tools among them are color coded cards, toy blocks to analyze the ability to follow instructions, and picture books to see the child's imagination. She also tested motor skills by asking son to do certain movements according to her instructions.
Before engaging our son, she collected as much information as possible from us especially in family history. Son didn't take long to get comfortable in the spacious consultation room.
The session lasted a bit more than 2 hours, and the final result is that our son does not have Asperger's and he only has some of the traits of autism. In other words, mild autism. So he was categorized under PDD-NOS.
He is also officially awarded the Orang Kelainan Upaya (OKU) status (Persons with different abilities) which will enable him to get certain benefits from the Government. We are applying for this status at JKM to be able to certify his needs and hopefully get some kind of priority for therapies and treatments when necessary.
The doctor provides us with the forms to be submitted. Officially, the main diagnosis is still Autism Spectrum Disorder. I have no official source to quote, but in 2013 Asperger's will not be categorized separately and will also be a part of ASD. The doctor also mentioned this.
Are we surprised? No we are not. But it's official. We now need to train ourselves to take care of our autistic child.
As for schooling, the doctor advises us to get him into a normal school. But we've tried and it's not possible right now due to his inability to listen to instructions and react properly to social cues. We are hoping that after therapies he will improve and he can go to school.
Asked about whether siblings will help him improve, the doctor said definitely but she also warned us now that out first child is autistic, there is an 8% probability that our next child will be autistic too.
Back then, we had to think. As the time of writing, we have decided to try for his brother or sister later this year when I'm all settled down with my job issues.
The biggest issues right now would be securing funds for the therapies, and actually getting the appointment for the therapies. They are in high demand and waiting lists are actually listed as months!
Cheers,
- Abah
We managed to secure the appointment with Prof Madya Dr. Raja Juanita Raja Lope at the UKM Specialist Centre and went there on the 26th of December 2012. Her specialty is Developmental Paediatrics.
The doctor is really nice, and we are very satisfied with the diagnosis session. She had a lot of tools among them are color coded cards, toy blocks to analyze the ability to follow instructions, and picture books to see the child's imagination. She also tested motor skills by asking son to do certain movements according to her instructions.
Before engaging our son, she collected as much information as possible from us especially in family history. Son didn't take long to get comfortable in the spacious consultation room.
The session lasted a bit more than 2 hours, and the final result is that our son does not have Asperger's and he only has some of the traits of autism. In other words, mild autism. So he was categorized under PDD-NOS.
Some developmental health professionals refer to PDD-NOS as “subthreshold autism." In other words, it’s the diagnosis they use for someone who has some but not all characteristics of autism or who has relatively mild symptoms. For instance, a person may have significant autism symptoms in one core area such as social deficits, but mild or no symptoms in another core area such as restricted, repetitive behaviors.So we are advised to get him to therapies such as occupational therapies and speech therapy. We were also instructed to get a hearing test done.
He is also officially awarded the Orang Kelainan Upaya (OKU) status (Persons with different abilities) which will enable him to get certain benefits from the Government. We are applying for this status at JKM to be able to certify his needs and hopefully get some kind of priority for therapies and treatments when necessary.
The doctor provides us with the forms to be submitted. Officially, the main diagnosis is still Autism Spectrum Disorder. I have no official source to quote, but in 2013 Asperger's will not be categorized separately and will also be a part of ASD. The doctor also mentioned this.
Are we surprised? No we are not. But it's official. We now need to train ourselves to take care of our autistic child.
As for schooling, the doctor advises us to get him into a normal school. But we've tried and it's not possible right now due to his inability to listen to instructions and react properly to social cues. We are hoping that after therapies he will improve and he can go to school.
Asked about whether siblings will help him improve, the doctor said definitely but she also warned us now that out first child is autistic, there is an 8% probability that our next child will be autistic too.
Back then, we had to think. As the time of writing, we have decided to try for his brother or sister later this year when I'm all settled down with my job issues.
The biggest issues right now would be securing funds for the therapies, and actually getting the appointment for the therapies. They are in high demand and waiting lists are actually listed as months!
Cheers,
- Abah