Piecing together the puzzle of PIP though neuropsychological assessment
Piecing together the puzzle of PIP though neuropsychological assessment
When someone is diagnosed with a severely disabling neurological or mental health condition life can seem unjust and unfair. Maybe a person used to really enjoy their job and can no longer work in this profession. Perhaps they aspired to buy that property they’d always dreamed of or wanted to support their children through the best education possible. Sometimes the pressures to provide and maintain payment of bills can leave people feeling extremely vulnerable.
The purpose of Personal Independence Payment (PIP), formerly known as Disability Living Allowance (DLA), is provided by the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) to help overcome these disparities. For people who need help with everyday tasks and or mobility, this funding can be the difference between a good and a poor quality of life. But sometimes the struggles that people with neurological or mental health conditions face are more obvious than others. Never has this been more evident than when talking about cognitive difficulties.
Cognitive difficulties are invisible and yet they can have a profound impact on a person’s ability to function in daily life. Just think, what would it be like if you found it hard to learn new information, if you couldn’t plan your way from one place to another, or even, that you couldn’t fully understand what another person has said? It would be potentially confusing, confidence destroying, and very limiting. But what if you could make some of these invisible difficulties visible? What if this meant that people turned round and listened?
This is where neuropsychological assessments come in. The goal of a neuropsychological assessment is to measure cognition using standardised and validated behavioural tests. These can be used to pinpoint strengths but also can provide evidence of weaknesses – those things that get in the way of doing activities. If the neuropsychological assessment is conducted with a clinical psychologist specialising in neuropsychology, they can also consider how any cognitive difficulties interact with emotional wellbeing.
At The London Neurocognitive Clinic, we welcome enquiries from people in the midst of applying for PIP. While we cannot guarantee that we will identify any cognitive difficulties, where there are clear weaknesses, we will advise you on what to do next. Please get in touch if you’d like to explore this with our experts.
