Kids in Hull waiting 6 months for autism diagnosis
Events are taking place as part of autism awareness month.
Children in Hull are waiting around 6 months to be diagnosed with autism - new figures show.
There are now calls for kids suspected of having the condition to be diagnosed quicker.
Hull mum Jacqueline Hoe has two children with autism.
Unlike her son - it took 6 years for her 10-year-old daughter to be diagnosed and says not having that early support has been detrimental. She told Viking:
"Comparing my son and daughter, my son is doing really well and is in mainstream secondary school now because he has had the right support in place from being a toddler so the difference is enormous. Whereas my daughter, the frustration and anger issues she suffers, I can't say they won't have been there before but I don't think they will have been as bad.
"We have had enormous problems, my daughter now has severe learning difficulties and she chose not to speak a lot in school so she was left in school which didn't help matters.
"It is awful, she has anger problems and it was very difficult getting her to school and it is very difficult as a parent watching your child when you know that extra support will have a big help.
"Parents get told by someone along the way that something isn't right then they got told that they have been referred to the autism panel but they don't get told what the condition is, nobody tells them anything and they just get left. I also think children need to know as with any other disability children would know what it was."
NHS Hull CCG say that by July - they hope to ensure that no child has to wait longer than 18 weeks for a diagnosis - with plans to reduce this further to 12 weeks as soon as possible.
A spokesperson for NHS Hull CCG and HumberNHS Foundation Trust said:
“Currently children in Hull are waiting on average 24 weeks from their initial referral to their formal assessment and diagnosis of autism.
"We fully understand that waiting for a diagnosis can be a distressing and worrying time for parents and children alike, therefore we aim to reduce waiting times in Hull significantly during 2016/17. By July 2016 we aim for no child to be waiting longer than 18 weeks, from their referral to their assessment, with plans to reduce this further to 12 weeks as soon as possible."