ASSOCIATED PROBLEMS TO AS:
Dyspraxia:
Developmental dyspraxia, referred to as developmental coordination disorder (DCD) in the US and Europe, is a chronic neurological disorder beginning in childhood that can affect planning of movements and co-ordination as a result of brain messages not being accurately transmitted to the body. Up to 50% of dyspraxics have ADHD. It may be diagnosed in the absence of other motor or sensory impairments like cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy, multiple sclerosis or Parkinson's disease.
Various areas of development can be affected by developmental dyspraxia and these will persist into adulthood, as dyspraxia has no cure. Often various coping strategies are developed, and these can be enhanced through occupational therapy, physiotherapy, speech therapy, or psychological training.
Speech and language
Developmental verbal dyspraxia (DVD) is a type of ideational dyspraxia, causing linguistic or phonological impairment. This is the favoured term in the UK; however, it is also sometimes referred to as articulatory dyspraxia, and in the United States the usual term is childhood apraxia of speech (CAS).
Key problems include:
Difficulties making speech sounds
Difficulty sequencing sounds
Within a word
Forming words into sentences
Difficulty controlling breathing, suppressing salivation and phonation when talking or singing with lyrics.
Difficulty with feeding.
Fine motor control
Difficulties with fine motor co-ordination lead to problems with handwriting, which may be due to either ideational or ideo-motor difficulties. Problems associated with this area may include:
Learning basic movement patterns.
Developing a desired writing speed.
Establishing the correct pencil grip
Hand aching while writing.
Fine-motor problems can also cause difficulty with a wide variety of other tasks such as using a knife and fork, fastening buttons and shoelaces, cooking, brushing one's teeth, applying cosmetics, styling one's hair, opening jars and packets, locking and unlocking doors, shaving, and doing housework.
Whole body movement, coordination, and body image
Issues with gross motor coordination mean that major developmental targets including walking, running, climbing and jumping can be affected. The difficulties vary from child to child and can include the following:
Poor timing.
Poor balance (sometimes even falling over in mid-step). Tripping over one's own feet is also common.
Difficulty combining movements into a controlled sequence.
Difficulty remembering the next movement in a sequence.
Some people with dyspraxia have trouble picking up and holding onto simple objects such as picking pencils and things up, owing to poor muscle tone and/or proprioception.
This disorder can cause an individual to be clumsy to the point of knocking things over and bumping into people accidentally.
Cross-laterality, ambidexterity, and a shift in the preferred hand are also common in people with dyspraxia.
Problems with chewing foods
People with dyspraxia may also have trouble determining the distance between them and other objects.
General difficulties
In addition to the physical impairments, dyspraxia is associated with problems with memory, especially short-term memory.This typically results in difficulty remembering instructions, difficulty organizing one's time and remembering deadlines, increased propensity to lose things or problems carrying out tasks which require remembering several steps in sequence (such as cooking). Whilst most of the general population experience these problems to some extent, they have a much more significant impact on the lives of dyspraxic people. However, many dyspraxics have excellent long-term memories, despite poor short-term memory.
Many dyspraxics benefit from working in a structured environment, as repeating the same routine minimises difficulty with time-management and allows them to commit procedures to long-term memory.
People with dyspraxia may have sensory processing disorder, including abnormal oversensitivity or undersensitivity to physical stimuli, such as touch, light, sound, and smell. This may manifest itself as an inability to tolerate certain textures such as sandpaper or certain fabrics and including oral toleration of excessively textured food (commonly known as picky eating), or even being touched by another individual (in the case of touch oversensitivity) or may require the consistent use of sunglasses outdoors since sunlight may be intense enough to cause discomfort to a dyspraxic (in the case of light oversensitivity). An aversion to loud music and naturally loud environments (such as clubs and bars) is typical behavior of a dyspraxic individual who suffers from auditory oversensitivity, while only being comfortable in unusually warm or cold environments is typical of a dyspraxic with temperature oversensitivity. Undersensitivity to stimuli may also cause problems. Dyspraxics who are undersensitive to pain may injure themselves without realising. Some dyspraxics may be oversensitive to some stimuli and undersensitive to others. These are commonly associated with autism spectrum conditions.
People with dyspraxia sometimes have difficulty moderating the amount of sensory information that their body is constantly sending them, so as a result these people are prone to panic attacks. Having other autistic traits (which is common with dyspraxia and related conditions) may also contribute to sensory-induced panic attacks.
Dyspraxia can cause problems with perception of distance, and with the speed of moving objects and people This can cause problems moving in crowded places and crossing roads and can make learning to drive a car extremely difficult or impossible.
Moderate to extreme difficulty doing physical tasks is experienced by some dyspraxics, and fatigue is common because so much extra energy is expended while trying to execute physical movements correctly. Some (but not all) dyspraxics suffer from hypotonia, which in this case is chronically low muscle tone caused by dyspraxia. People with this condition can have very low muscle strength and endurance (even in comparison with other dyspraxics) and even the simplest physical activities may quickly cause soreness and fatigue, depending on the severity of the hypotonia. Hypotonia may worsen a dyspraxic's already poor balance.
Overlap with other conditions
Dyspraxics may have other difficulties that are not due to dyspraxia itself but often co-exist with it. This is sometimes referred to as comorbidity. Dyspraxics may have characteristics of dyslexia (difficulty with reading and spelling), dyscalculia (difficulty with mathematics), dysgraphia (an inability to write neatly and/or draw), autism spectrum disorder or ADHD (poor attention span and impulsive behaviour). However, they are unlikely to have problems in all of these areas. The pattern of difficulty varies widely from person to person, and it is important to understand that a major weakness for one dyspraxic can be a strength or gift for another. For example, while some dyspraxics have difficulty with readisg and spelling due to an overlap with dyslexia, or numeracy due to an overlap with dyscalculia, others may have brilliant reading and spelling or mathematical abilities. Some estimates show that up to 50% of dyspraxics have ADHD.
Students with dyspraxia struggle most in visual-spatial memory. When compared to their peers who don’t have motor difficulties, students with dyspraxia are seven times more likely than typically developing students to achieve very poor scores in visual-spatial memory. As a result of this working memory impairment, students with dyspraxia have learning deficits as well.
Some students with dyspraxia can also have comorbid specific language impairment (SLI). Research has found that students with dyspraxia and normal language skills still experience learning difficulties despite relative strengths in language. This means that for students with dyspraxia their working memory abilities determine their learning difficulties. Any strength in language that they have is not able to sufficiently support their learning.
Other names include:
Developmental Apraxia
Dyspraxia
Developmental Co-ordination Disorder (DCD) - a subtly different condition by definition, in practice, very similar.
Motor Learning Difficulties
Perceptuo-motor dysfunction
Sensorimotor dysfunction[1]
The World Health Organisation currently lists Developmental Dyspraxia as Specific Developmental Disorder of Motor Function.
It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Developmental dyspraxia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_skills_disorder
The disorder has its basis in the brain, a network of neural connections that allow humans to process the information received. Motor Dyspraxia is a result of weak or disorganised connections in the brain, which then translates to trouble with motor coordination. Movements are performed because the brain sends messages to the area requiring action. The dyspraxia is a result of weak or poorly structured neural pathways to the moving parts of the body.
Clumsiness and tendency to fall down are a matter of poor balance and gross motor coordination. The origin of all of these difficulties is the vestibular system of the inner ear. The vestibule is an organ responsible for maintaining balance and coordination and is located beside the cochlea, which acts as a sound receptor. Although they attend to different information, the proximity of the vestibule and cochlea allows them to complement each other. The other consequence of their relationship is that if one system is not functioning well, the other is concurrently affected.
People with dyspraxia also tend to have an overly sensitive tactile system that causes them to perceive the most benign touch as unpleasant. They may also have a very low pain-threshold or have an automatic reaction of fear – tactile defensiveness – when touched. This is a result of a sensory integrative dysfunction, which describes a problem in the way the brain interprets information received from the senses. This problem, like that of coordination, originates in the vestibule, as all sensory information is transmitted to the vestibule before being sent to the cerebellum, the part of the brain associated with movement.
The causes of this disorder are unknown, but it is thought to originate with inner ear problems, possibly resultant from head injuries or childhood diseases. Children with motor skills disorder often suffer low self-esteem resulting from poor ability at sports and teasing by other children.
ADHD: Attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_deficit_hyperactivity_disorder
Attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a mental disorder and neurobehavioral disorder[2] characterized by either significant difficulties of inattention or hyperactivity and impulsiveness or a combination of the two. According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV-TR), symptoms emerge before seven years of age. There are three subtypes of the disorder which consist of it being predominantly inattentive (ADHD-PI or ADHD-I), predominantely hyperactive-impulsive (ADHD-HI or ADHD-H), or the two combined (ADHD-C). Oftentimes people refer to ADHD-PI as "attention deficit disorder" (ADD), however, the latter has not been officially accepted since the 1994 revision of the DSM. ADHD impacts school-aged children and results in restlessness, acting impulsively, and lack of focus which impairs their ability to learn properly.
It is the most commonly studied and diagnosed psychiatric disorder in children, affecting about 3 to 5 percent of children globally and is diagnosed in about 2 to 16 percent of school-aged children. It is a chronic disorder with 30 to 50 percent of those individuals diagnosed in childhood continuing to have symptoms into adulthood. Adolescents and adults with ADHD tend to develop coping mechanisms to compensate for some or all of their impairments. It is estimated that 4.7 percent of American adults live with ADHD. ADHD is diagnosed two to four times more frequently in boys than in girls.Its symptoms can be difficult to differentiate from other disorders, increasing the likelihood that the diagnosis of ADHD will be missed. In addition, most clinicians have not received formal training in the assessment and treatment of ADHD, in particular in adult patients. Standardized rating scales can be used for ADHD screening and assessment of the disorder's symptoms' severity.
ADHD management usually involves some combination of medications, behavior therapy, lifestyle changes, and counseling. Only children with severe ADHD symptoms should be considered for medication as a first-line treatment option. Medication therapy can also be considered for those with moderate ADHD symptoms who either refuse psychotherapeutic options or else fail to respond to psychotherapeutic input.:p.317
ADHD and its diagnosis and treatment have been considered controversial since the 1970s. The controversies have involved clinicians, teachers, policymakers, parents and the media. Topics include ADHD's causes, and the use of stimulant medications in its treatment. Most healthcare providers accept ADHD as a genuine disorder with debate in the scientific community centering mainly around how it is diagnosed and treated. The National Institute for Clinical Excellence, while acknowledging the controversy, states that the current treatments and methods of diagnosis are based on the dominant view of the academic literature.
ODD: Oppositional defiant disorder
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oppositional_defiant_disorder
Oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) is a diagnosis described by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) as an ongoing pattern of anger guided disobedience, hostilely defiant behavior toward authority figures which goes beyond the bounds of normal childhood behavior. Children suffering from this disorder may appear very stubborn and often angry. A diagnosis of ODD cannot be given if the child presents with conduct disorder (CD).
Common features of oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) include excessive, often persistent anger, frequent temper tantrums or angry outbursts, as well as disregard for authority. Children and adolescents with ODD often purposely annoy others, blame others for their own mistakes, and are easily disturbed. Parents often observe more rigid and irritable behaviors than in siblings.[2] In addition, these young people may appear resentful of others and when someone does something they don't like they prefer taking revenge more than sensitive solutions.
For a child or adolescent to qualify for a diagnosis of ODD these behaviors must cause considerable distress for the family and/or interfere significantly with academic or social functioning. Interference might take the form of preventing the child or adolescent from learning at school or making friends, or placing him or her in harmful situations. These behaviors must also persist for at least six months. Effects of ODD can be greatly amplified by other disorders in comorbidity such as ADHD. Other common comorbid disorders include depression and substance use disorders.
Specific Literacy Difficulties:
Indigestion problems:
Sensory Integration Disorder:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensory_integration_disorder
Sensory integration dysfunction (SID) is a hypothesized dysfunction of the vestibular system. It is characterized by increased or decreased sensitivity to stimuli. Currently, there is a movement to change the name of the dysfunction to Sensory Processing Disorder. It is not a recognized diagnosis in the DSM-IV-TR or the ICD-10.
SID was first described in-depth by occupational therapist Anna Jean Ayres (1920–1989), who defined sensory integration as the ability to organize sensory information for use by the brain. According to Ayres's writings, an individual with SID would, therefore, have a decreased ability to organize sensory information as it comes in through the senses.
Dyslexic:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyslexia
Dyslexia is a very broad term defining a learning disability that impairs a person's fluency or comprehension accuracy in being able to read, and which can manifest itself as a difficulty with phonological awareness, phonological decoding, processing speed, orthographic coding, auditory short-term memory, language skills/verbal comprehension, and/or rapid naming. Dyslexia is distinct from reading difficulties resulting from other causes, such as a non-neurological deficiency with vision or hearing, or from poor or inadequate reading instruction. It is believed that dyslexia can affect between 5 and 10 percent of a given population although there have been no studies to indicate an accurate percentage.
There are three proposed cognitive subtypes of dyslexia (auditory, visual and attentional), although individual cases of dyslexia are better explained by specific underlying neuropsychological deficits and co-occurring learning disabilities (e.g. attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, math disability, etc.). Reading disability, or dyslexia, is the most common learning disability. Although it is considered to be a receptive language-based learning disability in the research literature, dyslexia also affects one's expressive language skills. Researchers at MIT found that people with dyslexia exhibited impaired voice-recognition abilities.
Adult dyslexics can read with good comprehension, but they tend to read more slowly than non-dyslexics and perform more poorly at spelling and nonsense word reading, a measure of phonological awareness. Dyslexia and IQ are not interrelated as a result of cognition developing independently.
Conduct Disorder:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conduct_disorder
Conduct disorder is a psychological disorder diagnosed in childhood that presents itself through a repetitive and persistent pattern of behavior in which the basic rights of others or major age-appropriate norms are violated. These behaviors are often referred to as "antisocial behaviors."[1] Indeed, the disorder is often seen as the precursor to antisocial personality disorder.
Foetal Anti-Convulsant Syndrome with co-morbidities:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anticonvulsant
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comorbidity
OCD: Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
Obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) is an anxiety disorder characterized by intrusive thoughts that produce uneasiness, apprehension, fear, or worry; by repetitive behaviors aimed at reducing the associated anxiety; or by a combination of such obsessions and compulsions. Symptoms of the disorder include excessive washing or cleaning; repeated checking; extreme hoarding; preoccupation with sexual, violent or religious thoughts; relationship-related obsessions; aversion to particular numbers; and nervous rituals, such as opening and closing a door a certain number of times before entering or leaving a room. These symptoms can be alienating and time-consuming, and often cause severe emotional and financial distress. The acts of those who have OCD may appear paranoid and potentially psychotic. However, OCD sufferers generally recognize their obsessions and compulsions as irrational, and may become further distressed by this realization.
Obsessive–compulsive disorder affects children and adolescents as well as adults. Roughly one third to one half of adults with OCD report a childhood onset of the disorder, suggesting the continuum of anxiety disorders across the life span.
The phrase obsessive–compulsive has become part of the English lexicon, and is often used in an informal or caricatured manner to describe someone who is excessively meticulous, perfectionistic, absorbed, or otherwise fixated. Although these signs are present in OCD, a person who exhibits them does not necessarily have OCD, and may instead have obsessive–compulsive personality disorder (OCPD), an autism spectrum disorder, disorders where perseveration is a possible feature (ADHD, PTSD, bodily disorders or habit problems), or no clinical condition.
Despite the irrational behaviour, OCD is sometimes associated with above-average intelligence. Its sufferers commonly share personality traits such as high attention to detail, avoidance of risk, careful planning, exaggerated sense of responsibility and a tendency to take time in making decisions. Multiple psychological and biological factors may be involved in causing obsessive–compulsive syndromes. Standardized rating scales such as Yale–Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale can be used to assess the severity of OCD symptoms.
Tourettes Syndrome (displays motor twitches and vocal tics):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourette_syndrome
Tourette syndrome (also called Tourette's syndrome, Tourette's disorder, Gilles de la Tourette syndrome, GTS or, more commonly, simply Tourette's or TS) is an inherited neuropsychiatric disorder with onset in childhood, characterized by multiple physical (motor) tics and at least one vocal (phonic) tic. These tics characteristically wax and wane, can be suppressed temporarily, and are preceded by a premonitory urge. Tourette's is defined as part of a spectrum of tic disorders, which includes transient and chronic tics.
Tourette's was once considered a rare and bizarre syndrome, most often associated with the exclamation of obscene words or socially inappropriate and derogatory remarks (coprolalia), but this symptom is present in only a small minority of people with Tourette's. Tourette's is no longer considered a rare condition, but it is not always correctly identified because most cases are mild and the severity of tics decreases for most children as they pass through adolescence. Between 0.4% and 3.8% of children ages 5 to 18 may have Tourette's;[2] the prevalence of transient and chronic tics in school-age children is higher, with the more common tics of eye blinking, coughing, throat clearing, sniffing, and facial movements. Extreme Tourette's in adulthood is a rarity, and Tourette's does not adversely affect intelligence or life expectancy.
Genetic and environmental factors play a role in the etiology of Tourette's, but the exact causes are unknown. In most cases, medication is unnecessary. There is no effective treatment for every case of tics, but certain medications and therapies can help when their use is warranted. Education is an important part of any treatment plan, and explanation and reassurance alone are often sufficient treatment. Comorbid conditions (co-occurring diagnoses other than Tourette's) such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) are present in many patients seen in tertiary specialty clinics. These other conditions often cause more functional impairment to the individual than the tics that are the hallmark of Tourette's, hence it is important to correctly identify comorbid conditions and treat them.
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