My son had neuropsych testing here a year ago, and we had to have it redone this year by a different professional. The neuropsych report from Steinmann was brief, did not include diagnoses, and was not what the University needed for accommodations. Also, Sugarman stated in her report that my son did not have ADHD while for the past year he continued to have symptoms consistent with ADHD. The professional we saw this year found that my son does in fact have ADHD.
Dr. Sugarman herself did not meet with my son to administer tests, this was done by office staff. She spoke with my son for about 5-15 minutes to ask him what college accommodations he was looking for, assuring him she would provide that, but not to glean any additional information to complete the evaluation itself. We received the evaluation which was 6 pages long, mostly consisting of charts and missing recommended accommodations and any diagnoses. She briefly spoke with my son after providing the report (for about 5-15 minutes), during which she tried to sell him on a costly treatment called computer assisted cognitive remediation that she provides. In looking into the recommended computer assisted cognitive remediation treatment, it did not appear to be an empirically validated treatment. Dr. Sugarman also recommended this treatment to my friend's child who's clinical picture was completely different than my son's. After receiving the evaluation, we asked Dr. Sugarman to provide specific diagnoses and were told we would have to pay additional money in order to obtain that level of detailed information.
My son later reached out to Steinmann because the University said that his neuropsych report was not usable for accommodations. Dr. Sugarman provided a document listing functional limitations, some of which don't apply to my son, and others which are attributable to ADHD, and then stated that he should be encouraged to develop a relationship with each professor to establish accommodations.
Also, prior to the eval, Steinmann said they could bill insurance but that insurance would likely not cover it. I went through the process to have the insurance approve the eval under the billing codes provided me by Steinmann, but then after the evaluation they billed my insurance company under different codes than the ones they provided me. When the insurance company and I called together to ask them to rebill with the original codes, they left us on hold for 40 minutes before we gave up and hung up. We called a week later and they hung up on us three times in a row.
The neuropsychological testing we had done through a different provider was a very different experience. He himself met with my son for 7 hours administering tests. He spoke with my husband and I for an hour and a half to obtain more information. After providing a 16 page report he spent an hour and 45 minutes going over the results and answering questions. There were clear diagnoses, including moderate/severe ADHD. He also clearly listed academic accommodations (longer test times, tests administered in environments free of distractions, using a smart pen to take notes in class, etc) in his report. The cost of the test was roughly the same as what we paid at Steinmanns.
I have had two friends who also had a negative experience at Steimanns. I am worried about people not only wasting their money, but wasting time in getting inaccurate evals (I feel like my son's college experience last year would have been very different if he had had an appropriate diagnosis, an accommodations plan, and appropriate medication in place). read more
