Private Therapy Clinic - ADHD Screenings

Private Therapy Clinic offers ADHD screening and diagnostic assessment for both adults and children, delivered online or in person from its London base, alongside services that extend into wider psychiatry, autism assessment and coaching, and an NHS Right to Choose pathway. The clinic was founded in 2011 by Dr Becky Spelman, an HCPC-registered counselling psychologist, and has since grown into a CQC-regulated practice with a multidisciplinary clinical team drawn from consultant psychiatry, nursing and psychology. For ADHD specifically, assessments are carried out either by specialist nurse prescribers with ADHD-specific accreditation or by consultant psychiatrists, the latter typically reserved for more complex presentations or where other conditions are suspected alongside ADHD.

The assessment process itself follows a recognisable clinical structure rather than a single questionnaire. A structured clinical interview — running to a minimum of one to two hours of direct contact time — covers current symptoms and how they affect functioning across different areas of life, alongside developmental and psychiatric history. The clinic uses standardised diagnostic tools, including the DIVA-5 interview aligned to DSM-5 and ICD-11 criteria, and in some cases psychometric measures such as the Conners Adult ADHD Rating Scale (CAARS) or QbCheck, a computerised task-based screening tool that measures inattention, hyperactivity and impulsivity. Where possible, collateral information is sought from someone who knew the person in childhood, since ADHD assessment under NICE guidance depends on evidence of symptoms present from an early age. Screening for coexisting conditions such as anxiety, depression or autism is built into the process rather than treated as a separate step, and for children, the evaluation additionally draws on teacher questionnaires, school reports and, where relevant, IQ or cognitive subtests.

Reports produced at the end of the process are written to reference NICE NG87 guidance explicitly, and are intended to stand as formal diagnostic documentation rather than an informal opinion. Where a diagnosis is confirmed and medication is judged appropriate, the clinic can initiate prescribing and manage the titration period directly, before proposing a Shared Care Agreement so that ongoing prescribing can transfer to the person’s GP under NHS arrangements. This titration and handover stage is treated as a distinct phase of care rather than an assumed outcome of assessment — not everyone who is assessed will be offered or want medication, and the clinic also signals non-pharmacological routes, including ADHD coaching and CBT, as options following diagnosis.

The clinical team’s professional memberships span the British Psychological Society, the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies, the General Medical Council and the Royal College of Psychiatrists, reflecting the range of registrations needed to cover psychiatry, nursing and psychology within a single service. The clinic operates across extended hours, seven days a week, and its reach goes beyond a single London site, with services also referenced for Essex NHS assessment pathways and international arms of the practice in the UAE and Ireland. Dr Spelman has a public profile as a mental health commentator, with coverage in outlets including Forbes, Channel 4, Sky News, the BBC and The Guardian, which sits alongside the clinic’s day-to-day assessment work rather than substituting for it.

Taken together, this is a fee-based private and part-NHS-linked service built around a fairly conventional but well-documented diagnostic pathway: structured interview, validated tools, collateral history, differential screening for overlapping conditions, and a written report anchored to NICE criteria. It is best suited to people who want a formally recognised ADHD diagnosis — whether to access medication, to seek adjustments at work or in education, or simply to have clarity — and who are prepared for a process that is thorough rather than brief. The presence of both nurse-led and psychiatrist-led options gives some flexibility in how complex a case needs to be handled, and the explicit screening for co-occurring conditions such as autism and anxiety reduces the risk of a narrow, single-diagnosis view of someone’s presentation.