How does SMS differ from autism, Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), ADHD or Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD)?
There is a lot of confusion among parents and school professionals about the meaning of the SMS diagnosis in relation to other types of diagnoses that a child may receive. Like other psychiatric conditions, ADD, ADHD, and PDD are essentially symptom diagnoses, that is, they describe and categorize specific patterns of atypical behavior and development. By contrast, SMS is a cause diagnosis. It is based on specific genetic laboratory findings in a person with developmental and/or behavioral symptoms. By itself, the diagnosis of SMS does not tell you which behavioral symptoms an affected child has – there is a lot of variability from one child with SMS to the next. Among the most common behavioral symptoms associated with SMS are attentional disorders (ADD, ADHD) and autism spectrum disorders (PDD). A child or adult with SMS may have multiple symptom diagnoses plus a cause diagnosis all at the same time.
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