Psychological Testing
AGAPE provides psychological assessment services for children, adolescents, and adults. Psychological evaluations are often recommended when individuals experience significant difficulties that affect their school or work performance, relationships, or mood. They are helpful in guiding treatment interventions, providing clarity regarding a diagnosis, and highlighting strengths and weaknesses. People also often seek out a psychological evaluation before starting medication for their symptoms or to have documentation of their diagnosis to obtain certain benefits or specific accommodations.
Comprehensive, individualized assessments at AGAPE typically include clinical interviews, parent/teacher rating scales (for child/adolescent evaluations), administration of self-report and/or performance-based tests, and a feedback session. A review of records from past providers may also be included, if applicable.
To learn more about psychological testing, check out this blog post.
AGAPE’s psychologists specialize in assessments regarding:
- Behavioral, mood, and anxiety disorders
- Intellectual disability, giftedness, and learning disabilities
- Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI)
- Personality Disorders
- ADHD
- Evaluation for international adoption
- Pre-surgical evaluation
- Trauma
Can I use my insurance for a psychological evaluation?
At AGAPE, we do not file insurance for evaluations. Not filing insurance for evaluations allows us the freedom to select the assessment measures best suited to answer your questions and address your concerns, as well as spend the time needed with you to be thorough in our evaluation.
Why are evaluations more costly than therapy?
Psychological evaluations typically consist of multiple appointments that are longer than a one-hour therapy session. After conducting the assessments and interviewing you, your evaluator must score and interpret the data and compile it into a report before meeting with you to provide feedback. It is not uncommon for our psychologists to spend 15-20 hours working on your evaluation between the time spent with you and time spent reviewing records, scoring and interpreting the assessments, consulting with other psychologists, and writing the report.
Do you have a sliding scale for evaluations?
While we offer financial assistance for our counseling services through grants, special funds, and a sliding scale, we do not currently have any available for evaluations. We do offer the option for our testing clients to split their evaluation fee into two payments. We also structure our evaluation costs as flat fee packages, so that you do not pay any additional cost if one of our psychologists spends more time than anticipated on your evaluation.
How do I know whether I should start counseling or get tested first?
If you have participated in mental health treatment services on numerous occasions or for a significant period of time without the improvement you expected, an evaluation could be a helpful next step to confirm or clarify a diagnosis and offer treatment recommendations. Since the evaluation process occurs across multiple appointments, if you feel you cannot wait several weeks to begin talking through your concerns with a counselor, you may want to consider starting counseling first and scheduling an evaluation later, if needed, or doing them concurrently. The psychologist you speak with during your phone consultation can offer direction about this. We do not recommend that everyone we talk to pursue an evaluation; rather, we recommend what we believe would be an appropriate next step for you and in the best interest of your mental health.
Why do I need to do a phone consultation? Can't I just go ahead and schedule an evaluation if I know that is what I want?
We believe it is important to hear an overview of your concerns and symptoms to ensure that we can adequately answer your questions through the types of evaluations we offer, as well as determine the appropriate flat fee testing cost. Our evaluations are customized to your expressed concerns and what assessment measures we will need to administer. The phone consultation is also your chance to learn what to expect in the evaluation, ask questions, and develop comfort with the psychologist who would be conducting your evaluation. We want you to feel like your examiner hears and understands your concerns and would be a good fit for you.
I am overwhelmed trying to navigate mental health services. What should I be looking for to determine the quality of evaluations offered at different practices or agencies?
Consider the idiom “you get what you pay for” as you look at your options. Ask questions about the general type/number of assessment measures that would be used in your evaluation. You should expect that your examiner will look at multiple potential explanations/diagnoses to explain your current symptoms. You should also be offered a feedback session to go over the results and recommendations in the report.
Can I schedule a child custody evaluation or parenting assessment with you?
We do not conduct child custody or evaluations involving parenting capacity at AGAPE. This includes DCS ordered mental health assessments with a parenting component.