Neuropsychologist: who is he and in what cases should he be contacted?

Our state of health largely depends on how the brain works, whether there are any disorders of its functions, whether there is stress, memory disorders, and attention in a person’s life. A neuropsychologist deals with issues of brain health. It helps support the brain and restore its functions.

Neuropsychologist, special child psychologist Yulia Polukarova explains in more detail: “A neuropsychologist is a specialist who studies individual patterns of development of higher mental functions in a person. He describes possible deficits of a particular function (thinking, speech, attention, perception, memory), and also examines various mental phenomena of advanced development: the ability to memorize a large array of data (hypermnesia), the ability to perceive the surrounding world in the form of synesthesia, as well as savantism and other phenomena.”

What problems require the help of a neuropsychologist?

According to Yulia Polukarova, a neuropsychologist “conducts neuropsychological diagnostics, during which he presents a set of tasks and tests (tests) for completion. After he has carried out the diagnosis, he writes a conclusion where he describes the deficits, if any, as well as the person’s strengths , which should be relied upon in further work.

Then the neuropsychologist identifies correctional targets, according to which he selects a neurocorrectional program. It can be either cognitive - solving various problems, writing, finding errors or working with composing stories and retelling them, or sensorimotor, where a specialist uses various motor exercises to improve control over his movements, improve attention, serial organization of movements, etc.

Neuropsychologist for children

Clinical psychologist and psychology teacher Victoria Drachkova adds: “Adult neuropsychologists are contacted after strokes, traumatic brain injuries, removal of brain tumors and other injuries. Most often, patients with such injuries face weakened memory and attention, speech and thinking disorders, and difficulties with orientation in space and planning of one’s own activities. In this case, a specialist can conduct diagnostics to identify damaged and intact functions, develop a rehabilitation program, conduct a series of classes and give recommendations for independent exercises.

The scope of work of pediatric neuropsychologists is somewhat broader. In addition to brain damage, children may experience immaturity of certain functions. If, in case of damage to already formed functions, a rehabilitation plan is developed, then in the case of unformed functions, we are talking about the development of a correction program."

Neuropsychologists actually work with both adults and children, just on different issues. Yulia Polukarova listed the problems that a neuropsychologist can help a child cope with:

A pediatric neuropsychologist works with a child’s learning difficulties at school, for example, poor academic performance. A neuropsychologist conducts diagnostics and finds out the reason for poor performance, for example, decreased ability to remember. And he develops an individual program for the child to correct these difficulties.

A neuropsychologist also works with children with developmental disorders, determines the child’s current level of development, his immediate development zone, and carries out neurocorrectional work. For children with different types of disorders, it can last from 3 months to a year or longer.

The neuropsychologist also checks the child’s neuromotor readiness for school; he evaluates the development of the child’s skills before he goes to first grade.

You should contact a pediatric neuropsychologist in the following cases:

• the child has learning difficulties - he does not remember the material, reads poorly (in the second grade), writes poorly, handwriting is unclear, cannot solve examples and problems
• delayed speech development or mental retardation
• Difficulties with concentration and stability. The child is easily distracted
• Difficulties in self-control: he is often angry and aggressive, or often cries and cannot calm down
• the child cannot sit in one place for a long time, often jumps up, quickly loses interest in the game or task
• difficulties with coordination of movement, dexterity and reaction, the child often falls, does not see objects in front of him (with good vision), is awkward, often drops and breaks objects
• the child gets tired quickly, looks exhausted and tired all the time, it is difficult for him to sit and listen to the teacher for a long time, at the end of the lesson he lies on the desk or under it
• the child's lack of interest in anything.

Often a neuropsychologist works together with other specialists: a psychologist, speech therapist, speech pathologist, and audiologist. In such complex correctional work, the effectiveness of classes increases.