[senco-forum] Underdiagnosed disorders

Long term members of this forum know that I am diagnosed with
full-blown Tourette Syndrome (TS), though I'm fortunate in that I
don't have Coprolalia (the urge to swear uncontrollably) a TS symptom
that tends to get blown out of all proportion by the popular press.

You may also recall it was only 10 years ago I first found out I have
TS (at the grand age of 43), even though I've suffered sometimes
severe symptoms since I was a young child. How? Well one day I was
surfing the net and chanced across a reference to 'tics' and thought
'blink, blink' I do that ...and two seconds later I was staring at the
official diagnostic criteria for Tourettes Syndrome that fits me to a
'T'!

But what you may not realise is that Tourettes is not only well known
to medical science, but it's also quite common affecting up to 2% of
children before they leave school. The incidence of closely related
'transient tic disorders' (that spontaneously resolve within six
months) is even higher at around 50%. Like for example those pupils
who repeatedly drum on the desks with their fingers no matter how
often you tell them to stop.

Now a transient tic disorder may have little or no long term
significance from a clinical disease point of view -- it's a normal
temporary symptom associated with maturing neurology. But if these
symptoms are not recognised for what they are -- 'neurobehavioral
manifestations' and not thoughtless anti-social behaviour or
deliberate attempts to 'wind up teacher' -- and are reacted to (or
more often are over-reacted to) inappropriately, this has the
potential to cause a student long lasting psychological damage
including loss of self esteem; "...just don't understand why teacher
keeps picking on me, really I ain't deliberately doin nothin!".

The point I'm making here is that a great many medical conditions are
chronically undiagnosed, which is bad news for students and for the
staff who teach them. For example if you were to screen a school with
say 1,000 students TS you's likely discover around 20 students meet
the full diagnostic criteria. Resulting increased teacher awareness of
how TS symptoms manifest would serve to mitigate against applying
inappropriate behavioral modification strategies. Now don't get me
wrong, what I'm not calling for her is a countrywide screening
programme. But what would be useful is a web based educational
resource that highlights chronically undiagnosed disorders that have
potentially significant educational ramification.

Well that's what I'm working on right now, and what I'd like to know
from you good people on the Senco-Forum is what commonly
under-diagnosed or miss-diagnosed disorders you've come across that it
would be useful for your colleagues to have more awareness of, from
the point of view of their being able to provide more appropriate
support?

David Bowles