She basically said, "You know what? Whether or not CAPD actually exists is hugely controversial. These are the recommendations for students who have CAPD. Why don't you just try them, and skip the test?" The recommendations were very similar to what you would use for hearing impaired students, things like "avoid background noise".
I agree that trying recommendations if there is suspected CAPD is a good idea, because they can't hurt and they might help, whether or not it's CAPD. OTOH, I think it's important to test for a number of reasons. What if it's not CAPD but something else? It's not easy as a parent or teacher to sift through symptoms and know for sure what's up, but a neuropsych eval can point to very specific areas to look into as well as rule out challenges. If a child does have a challenge such as CAPD, they may have a teacher who is willing to give them accommodations without a diagnosis/testing/etc one year, but the next year end up with a teacher who doesn't believe the child has a challenge and won't accommodate. That's where having a diagnosis really helps, not with an individual teacher but with setting up a 504 plan and a record of accommodations that can follow a child through school. Although I don't have a child with CAPD, I have children with LDs and the other positive aspect to having an official diagnosis is understanding of why they are struggling (for parents and children).
polarbear
