Why is it so difficult to get a dyslexia diagnosis?

Kiaya
Jan 15, 2024
2 min read

Getting a diagnosis is tricky. Let me make the process a bit more straightforward for you.

Imagine finally getting that assessment report in your hands after months of searching, waiting, juggling schedules, and supporting your kiddo through it all.

The report finally comes back to you and it says (more or less):

Unable to determine if this child as dyslexia. Further assessment required.

All that hard work, time, and money for a big question mark? The frustration is understandable, given the lack of transparency in the assessment process.

Parents come to me saying

Wait, I thought this assessment was the real deal?
Why are they sending us to a different person now?
I've already paid a chunk. How much more is this going to cost?
I got the report, but what do I do next?
The teacher said we need an assessment, but where do we even start?
Can you just tell me if my child has Dyslexia?

I realised that all too often parents are being asked to blindly hand over money or rearrange their whole life for an assessment and process that no-one has explained to them.

Here is what I tell them

The assessment process is a bit complicated, here is why

Lack of standardisation

While there is a set criteria for a Specific Learning Difficulty - there isn’t really a standard set of assessments.

Each practitioner can choose the assessments that will help them get the best answers BUT not every profession can do every assessment.

Professional limitations

While a speech pathologist is qualified to administer most assessments and look at other

contributing factors like speech or language disorders, they cannot administer psychology assessments.

A psych can administer certain assessments and look at other possible factors (like ADHD, ASD, intellectual disability etc) but administer speech pathology assessments.

Teachers can undergo additional training to be able to administer some assessments but also cannot administer a Speech Pathologist’s or Psychologist’s assessments.

Confused yet?

Collaboration challenges

Because the criteria covers a number of different areas, each profession has something to contribute but they do not always intentionally collaborate.

Services like SPELD do take this approach, and can administer assessments at a (usually cheaper) rate, but the waitlists are sometimes too long for some families.

Knowing when to assess

While it does sound like a cliche, each family is on their own journey and will need different supports at different times.

Some children attend supportive schools that will do everything they can on parent request, while other schools require that extra nudge of “A Piece of Paper” to get the ball rolling.

So there is no clear answer on when to assess other than ‘the earlier the better’ but not too early, because they haven’t had a chance to learn everything yet, but also not too late because they will have passed the window for intensive intervention - and don’t wait too long because you need to prove a history of accommodations.

Yikes. It’s no wonder parents are tearing their hair out trying to figure this all out.

So what are we going to do about it?

My goal is to inform parents and upskill them as much as possible to support their child. Parents are the best advocates for their child, but they are also the most vulnerable to inaccurate and misleading information.

Which is why I put together a little webinar to help parents understand what is going on. The aim is to answer the questions: