03/10/2026
Leaks from NHS review would move ADHD and autism assessments to a "needs-based behavioural triage" system. We believe it is built on a dangerous medical blindspot.
Triaging the brain in isolation ignores the whole-body, multi-systemic physical illnesses that are inextricably interconnected with neurodivergence.
SEDSConnective is the community user-led charity mapping the direct links between symptomatic hypermobility and neurodivergence. Treating neurodivergence as a standalone behavioural or psychiatric issue risks being used to justify rationing healthcare.
Replacing clinical diagnostics with a behavioural checklist leaves neurodivergent people trapped in a loop of medical gaslighting and emergency admissions while their physical health goes unseen behind organisational silos. That also is now growing in education.
Hypermobility: framed for years as a young woman's condition, so men are not screened, not believed and not diagnosed. But under diagnosis in men is a known systemic problem.
Neurodivergence: autism and ADHD criteria like a lot of research were historically built on studies of boys, so the "male profile" became the template. Women and girls get missed, dismissed or picked up decades late and still are marginalised.
A woman is filtered out at the neurodivergence gate.
But a man is currently filtered out at the hypermobility gate.
Our community is also gender diverse, including non-binary and trans people and both these are missed at the gate.
Nobody gets looked at as a whole person BodyBrain. So a behavioural triage system inherits biases.
Due to these separations in neurodivergence and health issues including long term symptoms from some viruses, we are asking for support for an All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Hypermobility and Neurodivergence.
It will bring clinical data into Westminster to compel the Department of Health and Social Care, the NHS, DfE to look at the whole person and help explore this growing data with an inquiry and mandatory dual screening and fully integrated care pathways.
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Hypermobility and Neurodivergence - https://forms.cloud.microsoft/e/8p0krHQJD8
