We should keep the separate Asperger's category

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I don't know where you live, but here in the recession-bitten UK the NHS is already cutting services for people on the spectrum. My Cognitive Behavioural Therapist told me as much during our last session - he said that his department are no longer allowed to treat people with Asperger's unless they have also been disgnosed with a secondary disorder such as OCD or depression. Also, the specialist employment agency through which I obtained my job have lost their fuindoing for access to work visits, leaving aspies potentially vulnerable to the whims of uignorant and prejudiced managers even if they do manage to find and maintain a job.

Abolishing the AS category altogether will only give an incumbent Conservative government further excuses to sweep the condition under the carpet and pretend it doesn't warrant NHS funding for a referral or a diagnosis, as the key aim of their manifesto is to reduce public spending.
Admittedly though I don't know much about how the system workni in other countries such as the US.

My thoughts exactly. I think the DSM-V change is a travesty to the field of autism research. Yes, the change is being based on recent research findings, but I don't think that there has been enough research published about the possible differences between HFA and AS. Maybe they truly are identical conditions... Other than the speech delay. For the sake of treatment and such, sure, treat them the same way. But shouldn't we keep them separate for the sake of science and the understanding of the brain?

The very fact that AS individuals don't have a speech delay says SOMETHING about there being a different brain development for that condition. Plus, clumsiness and higher VIQ found in many AS individuals needs to be studied further. I am all for the discontinuation of the current PDD-NOS description, because, as of now, somebody with an AS presentation and somebody else with a more Kanner's autism presentation can potentially end up with the same diagnosis of PDD-NOS. But I feel very strongly about the discontinuation of AS. Revising the AS criteria in the DSM-V? Absolutely. Eliminating it? Sorry, but I don't think we're ready.

Also, I will be more than upfront about the fact that my opinions regarding this manner also deal with the fact that I myself have Asperger's. I don't connect with the term "autism." People who have the diagnosis of autistic disorder as it is currently defined have a far different presentation than I do. I don't feel that I have a serious enough condition to be called a full-blown autistic. That's why I like the Asperger's label. It differentiates the two. I'll be the first to admit that I feel that taking away the Asperger's diagnosis makes me feel that the APA is taking away a part of my identity. It took 50 years for Dr. Hans Asperger's work to be acknowledged in the DSM, and it's going to fall to the wayside in less than 20 years of recognition? I don't like that. I think it's unfair to his research.

Anyway, in conclusion, I am never going to stop using the term "Asperger's Syndrome." I like it, because it defines the exact set of symptoms that I have. I don't feel that "low-severity autism" describes my condition nearly as well. What is going to be the cut-off on this generalized "severity" scale that the DSM-V is going to have? I feel that the spectrum is becoming much too broad. Classifying me as a "low-severity autistic" implies that my problems aren't real, that they're mild. I think this is going to cause more stigma than there already is.
-OddDuckNash99-

Last edited by OddDuckNash99 on 05 Mar 2010, 12:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Severity is still a work in progress thing, but the last update had it as:

To add, part of their rationale (no one will be left behind):

Thank you for posting that, Danielismyname. I have no idea where I would fit in this. I clearly fit the "less severe ASD" (and what poor operational definitions these severity terms are...) category for "fixed interests and repetitive behaviors", but I probably only meet the "subclinical AS" category for "social communication" because I'm able to hide my social awkwardness pretty well. But that doesn't mean that I don't have problems with routines and sensory issues and change that clearly interfere with my life. And saying I have AS incorporates that variation between the severity of social and repetitive problems. And are they seriously calling it "subclinical AS"?! Or was that a typo for what was supposed to be "subclinical ASD"? Because if they seriously are keeping AS as a category determiner without keeping the AS diagnosis, that is just shameful. What is also shameful is this whole severity thing. How in the world is somebody to determine what distinguishes the amount of interference between less-severe and moderately severe and so on? The DSM already has enough problems with their terrible term of "significant impairment", and this is just increasing that ambiguity further.
-OddDuckNash99-

By that logic, there should be no diagnosese of either asperger's or autism, since the spectrum is continuous all the way to the other side of neurotypical.

And I would be happy with that too - just treat all people as people.

Which is quite irrelevant to the DSM which is published by APA, a US organization that the UK's NHS has no particular influence with. The DSM was intially published largely for the purpose of legitimizing claims to insurance companies. In other words a primary purpose of the DSM is and always has been making it easier to bill insurance companies for as many conditions, symptoms and causes of impairment or distress as their clients might exhibit. There is no benefit to APA or its members whatsoever in reducing the number of patients or services that can be billed to insurance companies.

And you think people are doing that because you've been diagnosed with Autism? I doubt most of them have even heard of it. They are mistreating you based on your appearance. Unfortunately that's a natural and instinctive neurotypical reaction - it's part and parcel of looking to faces and appearances for social cues - and no change to categorizations will do anything about it.


So you want all of us to be thrown to the wolves with you. How noble.

Exactly. And I think one very positive thing that could come out of this is that people will take more seriously the hidden potential of people currently written off by society as "LFA". If a group contains weird, briliant mathematicians, who knows what could happen if the people currently called "LFA" could communicate with keyboards or in pictures?

I agree, we should keep the subgroups. Not because it's insulting to anyone. I don't mind being lumped in with the likes of my LFA brother. I'm not going to morph into a low functioning autie because someone puts a label on me. I think we should keep the subgroups purely because they're specific, whereas 'autism spectrum disorder' in the new context could mean anything from the mildest of the borderline Aspergians whose only signs something is abnormal is that they can't tolerate sunlight and say 'poo' as a curse word instead of 's**t', to the LFAs who can't go anywhere because the sensory overload puts them rolling on the ground suffering from partial or complete paralysis.

I think they should have kept the discrete subgroups and simply diagnosed anyone who had the condition but didn't quite fit AS or Autistic Disorder as 'Atypical ASD'.

Anbuend...Sorry you have to put up with all that damn bigotry. That post made me want to hug you.

To associate you with those who cannot read or write normally may correctly lead others into re-estimating the skills of those people.

And standing aside to watch others get eaten by those wolves is noble?

The same guy that is yelling "ret*d" out his car window is also likely the same one yelling me a "beaner" at me. I also don't correct him by pointing out that I'm actually Asian-american, since that would be saving myself by selling out others. Screw that (entire strategy).

To the wolves: "I am Sparticus."

I like wolves. *sits and strokes wolves and shares my cookies with them*

Sorry, people, couldn't resist being unnecessarily literal and goofing off

Everything you said is important but I don't want to build a text pyramid so I'll just quote this bit, in the hopes that it gets read again and again.

This is so important. Being marginalized is being marginalized. Just because somebody has a low IQ doesn't make it suddenly ok to treat them like crap and marginalize them. Should respect and decency be reserved only for those who break that almighty 70 IQ barrier? NO!!

So thanks for writing this.

No. He wants you to help protect everybody from the wolves, not just those who are verbal or have an IQ over 70.

I can protect him just as well even if I'm not in the same classification - in fact, that lets me do it better.

I cannot protect him if I jump in to be eaten with him.