Neuropsychology Central

[Cree]

I am a PhD clinical psychologist with almost twenty years of experience. During training I learned to administer neuropsych testing and during my career I have done frequent abreviated screenings, as well as IQ, ADHD, LD, and other evals. After sustaining a mild brain injury (right-sided), the neuropsychologist hired by the disability insurance company is saying that my rehab doctors are all wrong. as were the two previous neuropsychologists who tested me and said I have mild TBI. Even on the "paid for" eval I showed a pattern on mostly right sided deficits - even on tests I knew well, or was at least familiar with. My question is, given my background, what norms can be validly applied to my test results. In other words, a PhD in clinical psych is going to respond differently to neuropsych testing than a PhD in anthropolgy. I would appreciate any thoughts or references. Thanks By the way, all of the "malingering" measures he used, showed that I was cooperative and made my best effort.

[lash]

Wow, that's something I worry about all the time. I always assume there are some tests out there I don't know, and using those measures are probably the only way I can ever be evaluated. I agree that norms might still be skewed given my general familiarity with many (likely similar) neuropsych measures, but there are some measures that have relatively limited practice effects, and those are probably the ones I'd be focusing on if I were doing an evaluation of a neuropsychologist. Also, some unfamiliar tests (such as a new list of vocabulary words) would be expected to be less sensitive to professional familiarity than others (such as an alternate block design test, which would be pretty easy for anyone who's administered a few zillion WAIS-R's or WAIS-III's).

Also, I should point out that the dissenting neuropsychologist could easily suggest that the fact you passed effort testing could reflect prior familiarity with those tests, allowing you to perform better on tests you know you should be performing well on. Not to say that's what's going on, just pointing out that passing them might not help you all that much in the long run, even though failing could only hurt you.

Good luck, you're in a position I've hoped I would never find myself in.
_________________
Lee Ashendorf, Ph.D.
Edith Nourse Rogers Memorial VA
Co-Webmaster, Neuropsychology Central

[Cree]

Dr. Ashendorf, Thank you for your reply and your empathy. I wish I could find some reference that would help me dispute the use of the testing to deny me benefits.