speech therapy evaluation?

DS is 15 months. I had his 15 mo well today. he has no words, not even mama/dada. he has great eye contact, points, babbles, waves bye and claps, but no words. so ped felt he should be evaluated by EI for speech therapy, gave me the number of an agency to call.
so i spoke to the agency today, the guy told me that based on what i am saying, he asked me a bunch of questions, he doesnt think ds will qualify, but i can definitly do the eval. i am going to, i feel like i have nothing to lose, and ped thinks i should.
so heres my questions
1. the guy from the agency told me theres no minimum wait time between evals, meaning if he gets denied now, i can re-eval at 18 months. for some reason, i thought you had to wait 3 or 6 months, but he assured me no. is this correct?
2. the agency told me they will contact the county,- i'm in nassau- and someone from the county will call me, shoudl be within the week. what exactly happens next?
3. do you think DS will qualify?

Re: speech therapy evaluation?

I had DS evaluated at 21 months. The therapists all said it was the perfect age because some kids are just late talkers.. 15 months is really early. Wait another 3 months and see what happens.. Then go through early intervention. There is a 3 month wait in between evaluations. I knew DS had a speech delay from 18 months on... I am not sure he will qualify at 15 months. He is still pretty young and there are no other issues. My son also had feeding issues and sensory issues.

Re: speech therapy evaluation?

Unless the evaluators see something else I can almost guarantee that with everything you said he won't qualify. And this is coming from someone who's DS didn't speak a word, not a word, until he was 3. At 15 months, if he's babbling, pointing, making eye contact and waving he's doing great. Does he understand you when you speak to him? Like basic stuff? If so he sounds great. All that said, evals never hurt. I would probably wait until he's 18 months if he still has zero words as it's sooo hard to get speech at 15 months if he's showing other age appropriate signs of communication which he is (pointing, waving, etc.).

Re: speech therapy evaluation?

thanks for the replies. i actually thougth it was a little early too, but my ped todl me to do it, and he is the most laid back guy ever. i'm waiting for hte person from the county ot call me, if there is in fact a 3 month wait between evals, I am definitly going to wait.

Re: speech therapy evaluation?

The general rule of thumb for NYS EI is no words by 18 months. It's VERY hard to qualify before that....however, I have seen it happen

The agency you called will send the referral to Nassau County Dept of Health. After 7-10 days, you'll receive a call from one of the Initial Service Coordinator. She'll set up an appt with you to go over/sign the initial consent forms, take some info (ped names, ins info, etc) and then ask you to pick the agency you want to use for the eval. Generally, you would choose the agency you called today. After this meeting with the initial SC, she'll notify the agency you choose to do the evals and a speech therapist and speical instructor will call you to set up the eval appt. If he qualifies, then you'll have a meeting with the county to authorize services to start. If he doesn't qualify now, you can request to reopen his case at 18mos or whenever you want prior to his 3rd birthday. HTH. Good Luck!

Re: speech therapy evaluation?

DS qualified for speech at 15 months but he had a very big delay cognitively as well as receptively.

Re: speech therapy evaluation?

Yay I love being able to help! I'm an SLP and just keep in mind a few thing where u or dh late talkers...is this ur first child? I would generally say 15 months is too early especially if the baby is attentive. Try to increase what u say to him...like if he points to something identify it to him before you give it. I would personally wait until 18 months. If u have any mor questions please feel free to fm me