Children's Neuropsychological Services, PLLC
Decoding the Brain: Insights into Learning and Behavior
Children's Neuropsychological Services has been dedicated to serving children, adolescents, and college-age students in the Capital District of New York since 2002. We offer consultations and comprehensive neuropsychological and educational evaluations for children and adolescents with neurological, developmental, and medical conditions that affect learning and behavior. The neuropsychological evaluation involves assessment of various brain functions such as attention and memory, as well as behavioral and emotional functioning in order to understand how the child learns and functions in day-to-day activities. We make diagnoses when applicable, describe the child’s overall pattern of cognitive and behavioral strengths and weaknesses, and share our findings and recommendations with parents, physicians, and specialists (i.e., primary care, neurology, psychiatry), and school staff in order to guide treatment and educational planning (i.e. IEP, 504 accommodations), with the goal of optimizing developmental outcome.
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Our clinical psychlogists and neuropsychologists have doctoral degrees in clinical psychology with specialized training in learning, emotional functioning and behavior, brain development, neurologic conditions, and medical complications that affect brain functioning and learning. They have had extensive training and experience administering and interpretating neuropsychological, academic and psychological tests.
Who We Evaluate
Individuals are often referred for neuropsychological evaluation due to difficulties in learning, memory, language, behavior or socialization.
Often these problems are secondary to neurologic and medical conditions that affect brain functions and learning such as:
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Epilepsy
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Traumatic brain injury / concussion
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Tic disorders / Tourette syndrome
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Brain Tumor
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Metabolic and immunologic conditions
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Hydrodephalus
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Cancer / Leukemia (treatment effects)
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Individuals may also be referred for neuropsychological or psychoeducational evaluation due to complex learning and attention problems and/or developmental conditions such as:
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Learning disabilities (e.g., dyslexia, math disorder, disorder of written expression)
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Language disorders
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Autism spectrum disorder
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Intellectual disability
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Genetic disorders (e.g., mitochondrial disease, Prader Willi syndrome, Fragile X)
What We Evaluate
Each evaluation is tailored to the individual child. The tests administered and the extent of testing varies depending upon the child’s age and the presenting concerns. The following is a list of abilities that may be assessed:
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General intelligence
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Attention
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Executive functions (such as planning, and organization skills)
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Processing speed
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Language skills
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Verbal memory
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Visual memory
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Visual perception
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Visual-motor integration (such as eye-hand coordination, writing)
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Academic skills (reading, writing, math)
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Behavioral and emotional functioning
How Is a Neuropsychological Evaluation Different From a School Psychological Evaluation?
Public schools perform psychoeducational evaluations at no cost to the student’s family. These often include assessments of intelligence, academic skills (i.e., reading, writing and math), and sometimes behavior. The goal of a school psychological evaluation is to identify eligibility for special education services. In contrast, the neuropsychological evaluation assesses a broader range of abilities with a detailed analysis of specific cognitive skills such as attention, memory, language, and visual processing in order to better understand how the child learns and what factors may be contributing to their learning difficulties. Neuropsychologists have unique expertise in neurodevelopment and how different neurologic and medical conditions affect the brain and learning, and this expertise helps guide the evaluation and recommendations. The information obtained from the evaluation is used to formulate treatment recommendations that can be implemented by families, treatment providers and schools.
Our neuropsychologists may attend your child’s school IEP or Section 504 Plan meeting in order to communicate their findings and recommendations to the educational team.