Your child’s primary care physician (PCP) should be screening your child when you go in for check ups. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) states that children should be screening when they go in for their 18 and 24 month well-child visits. If your physician has not done this yet for your child, please ask them to do this. These screens are usually done by the following questionnaires: Ages and Stages is a questionnaire that you complete that tells your child's doctor about how they are developing in all of their milestone areas (such as language, motor, cognitive, social, play, etc); and by the M-CHAT (Modified Checklist for Autism in Toddlers). This is also a questionnaire you fill out and if there are any areas of concerns, you and your child's physician will sit and discuss those areas of concern. This will help you decide if more testing is needed to determine if your child has concerns about autism.
Please remember that if you are concerned about your child's development you don't have to wait until 18 or 24 months, talk to your child's PCP now! Also, if your child is older than 24 months and you are concerned, please talk to your child's PCP about your concerns right away.
Finding out early on if your child is having some challenges with their developmental can help them get services early. Early intervention has been found to be a power tool to help children minimize delays and gain skills.
Click the following links to get more information about early screening and typical times when children reach developmental milestones :