The extent of GP ignorance about autism is high

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Looking at an article in today's Independent - which reports that 39% had no knowledge at all, and most of the others relied on personal impressions based on their family etc not objective findings.

The article was sourced from this piece published in The Conversation website:
http://theconversation.com/gps-urgently ... tism-77301

It's good that GPs are acknowledging the gaps in their understanding, with the right mindset ignorance can be rectified.
My family Doctor assured me that I was perfect and emphasised that 'they' are coming up with new labels for everything these days etc. Bless, she is old school.

Now....if 39% of psychologists/psychiatrists were ignorant of autism....then we would have a real problem!

In NZ, GPs are the referrers/gatekeepers to specialist services like psychology and psychiatry. You can self-refer as a private patient to psychologists directly though not through the general health system. I think there probably is a real problem at GP level here - only one GP I know has the foggiest idea about AS, and it's very basic.

I would say more than 39% of psychologists are ignorant of autism, but that's just my experience. Most that I have seen have no clue what they are doing. One psychologist kept changing my diagnosis back and forth so much (between autism and anxiety) that my insurance company had to call my mom because they were going to stop paying or something like that. It is honestly pretty ridiculous how ignorant people are ! I literally had to explain what autism was to this one because she had no clue.

I've found that they are. Particularly when it comes to females.

The truth about those professions is...psychology is one of the most studied fields because it's considered to be an easy major. So a lot of people end up in the field simply because they didn't want to study anything hard in college, and then ended up with a B.A. in psychology, and a lot of debt, so the logical thing was to get a job in the field they could get a job in, which was, psychology.

Psychiatry tends to be populated by the people who wanted to be medical doctors but who didn't really want to practice medicine.

I've only met two who even bother to do blood work to rule out disorders that can have a psychiatric manifestation.

I studied psychophysics as a speciality in psychology - it was the hardest of all the science papers I did. The easy degree option was considered to be Education.

Well, my GP isn't ignorant anyway - he was a very important step in my path to diagnosis. When someone had suggested the possibility to me, after getting over the shock of it, googling "Do I have autism" and ending up on the AQ test on Autism Canada's website and scoring 37, and getting over the shock of it again, the next person I talked to was my GP.

We talked for 5-10 minutes and he confirmed for me that I was showing some possible signs of it such as not making eye contact, and gave me a phone number I could call to find a psychologist who specialises in ASD/Asperger's.

Very glad that my GP has some level of understanding.

I'm glad too. Though I wish that your experience was more typical.

There is lot of ignorence of adult female presetation even amoung autism specialists.

I am sick and tired of writing in the am I autistic threads “see a clinicion knowlegeble about autism in your age and gender”. But it must be written.

I had a similar experience with a psychotherapist, like the GP, he also felt that there were too many labels being used, his objection was their self limiting tendencies.

The turning point was when I likened the first three decades of my life to the experience of a gay person who was still convinced that they were a straight person... It took him a few months to recognise that what appeared on the surface to be traits were really just the tip of the iceberg.

Not surprising at all. I went to a really good school and learned that even the the best students in the USA can't learn everything. It would be best if student doctors could be paired up with not only the best in various specialties, but also paired up with people who can best transfer the knowledge they need. And you run into the issue of the top expert not necessarily being the best one to teach that knowledge.

There is just SO MUCH to learn!

You realize this once you start working in a library.

It could also be that many GPs don't actually see the need to be autism experts.

You do want to be an expert on stuff like choking, so you can save people who would otherwise die. It would be awfully embarassing not to be able to diagnose and treat something like at in a public place like a ball park.

It would be different if they could prescribe a pill to fix autism.

Then you have those doctors who believe people with Asperger's and mild autism are "letting their symptoms get the best of them," so to speak---so they feel that the concept of the "Spectrum" as an "excuse" to "milk their symptoms for all it's worth," and to absolve themselves of responsibility.

I have run into this on plenty of occasions.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/does-your- ... -find-out/
While kickbacks for prescribing drugs are illegal, it is legal for them to get money for promoting drugs.

They would know more about autism if they got paid for promoting autism awareness.