Assessment fee
$720
One fee, everything included. There is no separate charge for the report. No Medicare rebate applies to ADHD assessment.
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Next step
Ready to book, or want to see an example first?
Written and reviewed by
Matthew Hallam
Registered Psychologist · AHPRA PSY0002471369
Practical info
What it involves
2 x 50 minutes
Two 50-minute sessions, plus pre-work you complete beforehand: four forms, arriving one at a time.
Where
Kew · Croydon · Online
Suite 413, 89-93 High Street, Kew. 88-90 Main Street, Croydon. Telehealth Australia-wide.
What you receive
3 documents
Your written report, a letter for your GP, and a report written for a psychiatrist.
The fee is for the assessment. It does not change depending on what the assessment finds.
Who this work is for
- Adults (18+) wanting a proper answer to whether ADHD fits, not a quiz result.
- People who suspect it has been missed, including those already treated for something else.
- People who want a written report they can take to their GP or a psychiatrist.
- Anyone in Australia, in person at Kew or Croydon, or by telehealth.
What this work is not
- Crisis support. If you are in crisis, please call 000 or Lifeline 13 11 14.
- For people under 18. Equal Psychology assesses adults and older adults only.
- A cognitive or learning assessment, or a physical examination.
- A prescription service. Psychologists do not prescribe; medication is a medical decision.
- A guarantee of any specific outcome, including a particular diagnosis.
Our assessment approach
The assessment is built to look at more than ADHD alone, because for most adults ADHD does not travel alone. As many as 80 per cent of adults with ADHD have at least one co-occurring psychiatric condition (Choi et al., 2022). Anxiety, depression, sleep difficulty, substance use and autistic traits sit alongside it often enough that an assessment which only asks whether this is ADHD will, most of the time, return an answer that is true and incomplete at the same time.
This is also what the national guideline asks for. The Australian evidence-based clinical practice guideline for ADHD, approved by the NHMRC, says a diagnosis should not be made on rating scales alone, that observations should be drawn from more than one setting and more than one reporter, and that finding ADHD should prompt consideration of what else may be present (Australasian ADHD Professionals Association [AADPA], 2022). Our process is built to follow those recommendations, and Matthew is a member of the association that produced them.
So the assessment does not stop once it finds ADHD, and it does not stop if it does not find ADHD either. It asks what else could be producing what you are noticing, what else might be sitting alongside it, and what belongs with someone other than a psychologist. You are probably asking this question for the first time, or the first time properly, and that moment is worth using well.
Some of what looks like ADHD from the outside is not ADHD at all. The guideline asks clinicians to look for conditions that can present similarly to ADHD or make it worse, naming thyroid disease and anaemia among them (AADPA, 2022). Poor sleep, anxiety and unresolved trauma can do the same. Screening for those sits inside the process rather than beside it, because the only way to tell the difference is to ask directly.
And some of what the assessment finds belongs with your GP rather than with us. That is why it ends with a letter addressed to the person best placed to act on what was found, rather than a diagnosis handed over on its own.
The protocol itself was developed in collaboration with consultant psychiatrist Dr Luisa Fernandez. That matters because the report has to be useful to a prescriber, not only to us. It was built with one in the room, rather than written by psychologists and sent off in the hope that it lands. If you choose to, you can see Dr Fernandez as part of the same pathway, and the fees page sets out what that costs.
A note on the word
We call this an assessment because that is the term most people know it by, and the one most people are searching for when they arrive here. Between ourselves we think of it as identification.
Assessment can carry a sense of something being looked for that is wrong with you. That is not what this is. Nothing is uncovered here that was not already part of how your mind works. What changes is that it gets named, and that you leave with language for it.
References
- Choi, W.-S., Woo, Y. S., Wang, S.-M., Lim, H. K., & Bahk, W.-M. (2022). The prevalence of psychiatric comorbidities in adult ADHD compared with non-ADHD populations: A systematic literature review. PLOS ONE, 17(11), Article e0277175. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0277175
- Australasian ADHD Professionals Association. (2022). Australian evidence-based clinical practice guideline for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). https://adhdguideline.aadpa.com.au
What actually happens
Step one
Four forms, before you meet us
They arrive one at a time, so you are not handed all of it at once. Between them, they ask a genuinely large number of questions. That is deliberate, and it is the reason the assessment can do what the section above describes.
Step two
A 50-minute first session
Fifty minutes, working through what the forms could not settle: your history, your current life, and the parts that do not fit neatly into a checklist.
Step three
A second 50-minute session for results
We go through what we found, what it means, and what happens next.
What we look at
Attention, now
How focus, follow-through and organisation actually work day to day.
How a day actually goes
Time, tasks, home, work or study, and the gap between intending and doing.
Growing up
Whether the pattern was there before adulthood, even if no one named it at the time.
Mood, anxiety, sleep and alcohol
Because each of these can produce or worsen what you are noticing.
Autistic traits
Screened for, not assumed either way.
Physical health
A short set of questions, because some physical things can look like this too.
ASRS v1.1 · WURS-45 · BDEFS · CABS · DASS-21 · RAADS-14 Screen · PC-PTSD-5 · AUDIT-C · TAPS-1 · developmental history form
See a complete example
Two fictional clients, full reports
Read the actual report a client would receive
Most services describe what an assessment involves. We would rather show you. These are complete reports for two fictional clients, published exactly as a real client would receive them: the full write-up, the formulation, the reasoning behind it, and the recommendations at the end, including the parts most services would not publish.
Noah and Frankie are not two categories of ADHD. They are two different routes to the same question. Noah suspected it for years, built a business around compensating for it, and everything else screens negative. Frankie was treated for anxiety for several years before anyone asked whether ADHD was part of the picture, and the report has to work through what belongs to which.
Reading both shows the assessment doing the work described above, not just describing it. If you read nothing else on this page before deciding, read these.
Who conducts the assessment
Psychologist · Co-founder
Matthew Hallam
Registered Psychologist · AHPRA PSY0002471369
Non-deficit therapy for adults who are done trying to fix themselves.
Matthew conducts ADHD assessments at Equal Psychology and also works with adults individually in ongoing therapy, whether or not an assessment is part of that. He is a member of the Australasian ADHD Professionals Association and works primarily with adult ADHD and neurodiversity.
Read Matthew's profile →If you choose to see a psychiatrist
Following your ADHD assessment, you may choose to see a psychiatrist for an independent psychiatric assessment, including consideration of treatment options and medication where appropriate.
Equal Psychology has developed its ADHD assessment protocol in collaboration with consultant psychiatrist Dr Luisa Fernandez of North Psychiatry, with the aim of ensuring that the information gathered and the psychiatrist report are clinically useful for a subsequent psychiatric assessment.
If you choose to see Dr Fernandez, your GP can refer you directly to her practice. She will review the Equal Psychology report alongside her own assessment and form her own independent clinical opinion. This may include considering other mental health or medical factors, identifying areas that would benefit from further assessment, and discussing whether medication or other treatment may be appropriate.
If medication is indicated, Dr Fernandez will discuss treatment options and appropriate follow-up with you. Depending on your individual circumstances, this may include ongoing psychiatric care or recommendations for ongoing management with your GP.
Seeing Dr Fernandez is entirely optional. You are also welcome to take your assessment report to another psychiatrist of your choice. The psychiatric assessment is a separate service, arranged and billed independently from the Equal Psychology assessment. Current appointment and fee information is available through her practice.
How we use AI, and where we do not
A plain account, because you are entitled to one
Some of the tools used to prepare your report are AI-assisted. We say this because you are entitled to know how your report was produced, and because it affects the fee: lower production cost is one of the factors in how the assessment is priced.
What the tools do
Help summarise the pre-work you complete. Help draft sections of the written report.
What they do not do
Diagnose you. Every finding is checked against the source material by a psychologist, and every diagnostic criterion is worked through with you in conversation.
What happens afterwards
Your report is yours to use. Most people take it to their GP. In some states, GPs can now diagnose and prescribe for adult ADHD directly. The rules differ by state and continue to change, so we will not promise what will happen next, only that the report gives that conversation something to start from.
Every assessment also includes a report written for a psychiatrist. You receive it whether or not you end up needing one, because prescribing pathways differ by state and a specialist opinion is often genuinely useful. A psychologist can assess and diagnose ADHD, but prescribing sits with a doctor, and we will say plainly where each fits for you.
If you would like psychological support afterwards, it is available and entirely optional. If you are not sure yet, a Meet and Greet is a low-commitment way to talk it through first: free · 15 minutes · online or in-person · no obligation.
Common questions
The fee stays the same either way. The report still sets out what was found, what accounts for the difficulties you brought in, and where that leaves you.
The report is written to support a conversation with your GP or a psychiatrist about next steps, including medication where relevant. We do not prescribe.
Yes. They are what allows the assessment to look at more than ADHD on its own, which is the reason the process works the way it does.
You do, and your GP if you choose to share it. We do not send it anywhere without your direction.
No, though an informant such as a parent or partner can add useful history if one is available and willing.
Yes. The whole assessment can be done by telehealth, anywhere in Australia, and that includes both sessions and the pre-work. Nothing about the process requires you to be in the room, and the report you receive is the same either way. If you would rather come in, we are at Kew and Croydon.
No Medicare rebate applies to ADHD assessment.
Ready when you are
Book an assessment, or start with a Meet and Greet if you would like to talk it through first: free · 15 minutes · online or in-person · no obligation.