Assessments at Hanover CBT
Thoughtful, Individualized Assessments for Children, Adolescents, and Adults in Hanover, New Hampshire
At Hanover Center for Cognitive Behavioral Therapies, assessments are not thought of as a search for what is wrong with someone. They are used to build a clearer understanding of strengths, challenges, patterns, needs, and next steps.
Assessments can help people better understand how they think, learn, process information, manage emotions, pay attention, navigate relationships, and move through the world.
Some people seek assessment because they are struggling in school, work, relationships, or daily life and want answers. Others are trying to understand attention difficulties, learning differences, autism-related questions, emotional or behavioral concerns, cognitive changes, how multiple challenges can be understood together, or long-standing experiences that have never fully made sense. The goal of assessment is not only diagnosis. It is understanding.
More Than Testing Alone
Assessment at Hanover CBT combines standardized testing with nuanced clinical thinking, collaboration, and attention to each person's lived experience.
Assessment clinicians at Hanover CBT may bring different strengths to the assessment process. Assessment questions require a strong focus on data, validity, and measurement. As well as, careful attention to developmental history, emotional experience, family context, culture, environment, and the story behind the scores.
Standardized measures can provide useful information, but they do not fully explain a person's way of being in the world. Assessment at Hanover CBT aims to integrate objective data with clinical interpretation, real-world context, and recommendations that are intended to be understandable, accessible, and genuinely support one’s daily life.
Why People Seek Assessment
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Attention and executive functioning difficulties, learning differences or academic struggles, memory, processing, or cognitive concerns, and strengths and learning styles.
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Autism-related questions and social, communication, or developmental differences.
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Emotional or behavioral concerns, diagnostic clarification, and why certain patterns have persisted despite effort or support.
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Recommendations for school, college, work, or accommodations.
For many people, assessment is not only about receiving a diagnosis. It is about making sense of experiences that may have felt confusing, frustrating, isolating, or misunderstood for a long time.
Child, Adolescent, and Adult Assessments
Assessments are shaped around the person's developmental stage, referral questions, goals, and context. Assessments for younger children often involve significant caregiver and school input, while adult assessments may focus more on self-report, history, life patterns, work or academic functioning, and long-standing experiences.
The process may look different depending on whether the assessment is focused on ADHD, autism, learning disability, diagnostic clarification, emotional functioning, cognitive concerns, or broader neuropsychological questions.
The goal is not to force every person into the same assessment structure. It is to ask useful questions and gather information that can meaningfully support understanding, care, school planning, accommodations, treatment, or next steps.
Assessment Pathways
Child & Adolescent Assessments
Assessments for children and adolescents are shaped around developmental stage, referral questions, goals, and context.
The process includes caregiver input and, when relevant, information from schools or other professionals. Assessment can help clarify learning, attention, emotional, behavioral, social, communication, developmental, or broader cognitive concerns and identify practical supports for daily life.
Adult Assessments
Assessments for adults can help clarify long-standing questions about attention, learning, emotional functioning, cognitive concerns, or behavioural patterns that have been difficult to understand.
The process considers self-report, developmental history, life patterns, work or academic functioning, relationships, and experiences that may never have fully made sense. Findings are interpreted in context and used to support clearer understanding, recommendations, accommodations, care, or next steps.
ADHD Assessments
ADHD assessments explore attention, executive functioning, and related areas that affect school, work, relationships, or daily life.
Assessment looks beyond isolated symptoms to consider history, functioning, environment, emotional experience, and the ways attention or executive functioning difficulties appear across different settings. The goal is to clarify what is contributing to the difficulty and what supports or strategies fit.
Autism Assessments
Autism assessments can help people better understand social, communication, developmental, sensory, behavioral, or relational differences.
The process brings together standardized measures, developmental history, lived experience, behavioral observations, and real-world context. Findings can help make sense of long-standing experiences and identify supports, accommodations, recommendations, or next steps that reflect the whole person.
Learning Disability Assessments
Learning disability assessments explore academic difficulties, learning patterns, cognitive strengths, and areas in which additional support is needed.
Assessment examine how a person processes information and why certain academic challenges have persisted despite effort or support. Findings can inform school or college planning, accommodations, learning strategies, and recommendations intended to support daily functioning.
How Assessments Work
The assessment process varies depending on the referral question and the type of assessment being completed.
It can include interviews, questionnaires, standardized testing, developmental or educational history, behavioral observations, emotional screening, record reviews alongside guaranteed feedback sessions. The purpose of each step within the evaluation is explained clearly, and findings are presented with interpretation and practical recommendations rather than scores without context.
Hanover CBT’s Assessments are Collaborative and Individualized
Assessment at Hanover CBT may involve collaboration with therapists, psychiatric providers, schools, physicians, parents, caregivers, or other professionals when appropriate and with consent.
Some clients come to assessment through therapy. Others begin with assessment and later connect with therapy, psychiatry, school supports, accommodations, or outside services.
The assessment process can also help clarify what kind of support will be most useful. Assessment reports are designed to provide interpretation and practical recommendations rather than simply presenting scores without context.
The assessment process varies depending on the referral question and the type of assessment being completed.
Clients and families can expect a process that is careful, respectful, and clinically professional. Hanover CBT clinicians work to explain the purpose of the assessment clearly and help people understand findings in a way that feels useful rather than overwhelming.
The goal is not to reduce someone to a diagnosis or a report. It is to help people better understand themselves and identify supports, strategies, accommodations, or next steps that may improve functioning and quality of life.
Frequently Asked Questions about Our Assessments
Most Asked Questions
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Evaluations are available for school-age children in kindergarten (~6 years old) through adulthood.
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Length of the evaluation is determined on an individual basis. If this is someone’s first evaluation, it may take longer than if he/she/they have been evaluated previously. In addition, evaluations for children (~ eight hours) often take longer than those for adults (~ five hours). If you/your child has been evaluated previously or recently, the evaluation take less time than if the evaluation were an initial evaluation.
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The evaluation report usually takes two to three weeks to generate and send. Once it is ready, you will receive an electronic version (PDF) via email and a hard copy via regular mail.
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Requests to expedite assessments are considered on a case-by-case basis.
If you require an expedited assessment, please let us know when you contact our office to request an assessment (either using the form on our website or over the phone if you call the office directly). We’ll gather the necessary information and pass it along to the assessment provider, who will make the final decision about whether we’re able to accommodate the requested timeline.
We’ll always do our best to support your needs and keep you informed throughout the process.
Cost & Insurance
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The cost of the evaluation depends on the need and complexity of the evaluation. Cost is also dependent on the amount of time your clinician will need to review any provided documentation (e.g., previous evaluation reports, IEPs, school reports, etc.). An estimated range for each evaluation is provided during the 30-minute free Zoom consultation with the assessment provider.
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HCBT does not take insurance, but we can provide you with resources and information to assist you in working with your insurance to help you get evaluation services covered.
Superbills: we provide detailed receipts you can submit to your insurance for reimbursement after payment.
Proactive support: we can help with prior authorizations or out-of-network exception paperwork before testing begins.
Resources: Click here for our CPT codes to help your insurance company estimate your coverage.
Testing Day
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During the evaluation, you should take all medications you typically take; however, if the purpose of the evaluation is to determine your performance when not taking a particular medication (e.g., evaluation of attention/distractibility while not taking Ritalin), your provider will discuss this with you ahead of your first testing day.
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Yes. This is true of both in-person and virtual sessions; however, you will need to provide your own snacks/drinks and may need to put them aside during some tasks. It’s important that you/your child feel at ease during the process. Bathroom breaks are always available, as needed.
Accommodations & Support
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Yes. If the data supports it, your comprehensive evaluation report is exactly what testing agencies need to see. If the agency requires an additional letter of support, your assessment provider will provide one.
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No. By law, the COE cannot be signed by the person who performed the evaluation. You should take your report to your college’s Disability Services office or your employer's HR department; they are the authorized parties to sign that specific document.
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Prior to participating in an IEP/504 meeting, it is highly recommended that you share the entire evaluation report with the school. Waiting until the school meeting to share the information usually results in the school needing to postpone the meeting until they have had time to review the report. The evaluation report and test score summary documents should include all of the information you need. If your assessment provider’s participation in the school meeting is still needed, this can be accomplished in either remote or in-person format at an additional cost.
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Yes! We don't want to just give you a report and say goodbye. We offer Diagnostic Teaching and specialized coaching to help you implement the strategies recommended in your evaluation.
