There are many reasons your Primary Care Physician (PCP), or Pediatrician may refer you to us. Contact your PCP or Pediatrician if you are unsure.

For a full description of services please see our Clinical Services page.

Once we receive your child’s referral, our Referrals Team will contact you to give you access to our patient portal. From the portal you will be asked to complete the new patient forms and the history section. We will also ask for your child’s most recent MDT (Multidisciplinary Team Evaluation) and IEP (Individualized Educational Plan) if they have one. Depending on your child’s age and reason for referral you may be asked to complete some preliminary assessments or provide more records. When all of this has been completed your child will be added to the waitlist and you will be contacted when it is time to schedule.

All new patients are required to have a referral from the child’s pediatrician regardless of insurance.

We are unable to give you an estimate of wait times or placement on the waitlist. There are many factors that affect scheduling including the availability of families, providers and the age and needs of the child. We are working diligently to get families scheduled as quickly as we can.

The Ackerman Center is contracted with most commercial insurance plans, as well as all Medicaid plans. Please contact us at autismcenter@grantagift.com to confirm if we are contracted with your specific commercial insurance plan.

You will need to contact your secondary insurance to confirm if they will cover our services when the primary insurance will not.

Medical record requests can be sent to autismcenter@grantagift.com. If requesting records prior to June 28th, 2021, you must contact UNLV Medical Records. As of June 28th, 2021, we are no longer part of UNLV and do not have access to any documents sent prior to this date.

For billing question please call 702-998-9505 or email us at autismcenter@grantagift.com

Many of our consent forms expire after one year and need to be renewed annually. We also want to be sure we have the most up to date contact and insurance information to avoid delays in being seen.

Due to demand the Ackerman Center often experiences a high call volume. For a quicker response, email us at autismcenter@grantagift.com or text us at 702-789-7869.

A developmental pediatrician will typically spend at least an hour with a child to conduct the initial evaluation. They will interview parents about a child’s developmental history, habits, abilities and challenges. Once the evaluation is completed a developmental pediatrician will provide a full report and a specific diagnosis when appropriate. Families may also receive recommendations for treatment, help finding therapists, and guidance on choosing educational settings.

Our nurse practitioners are trained in behavior and developmental issues. They evaluate, diagnose, treat and follow-up on the same concerns as our physicians. You will find them to be a wonderful addition to your care team!

Prescriptions for controlled substances must be initiated by the provider, via electronic exchange to the pharmacy. Please be sure to contact our office seven (7) days prior to needing a refill in order to ensure that you have it in a timely manner. You can request a refill via our patient portal, e-mail, phone call or text.

A neuropsychological evaluation measures a child’s intellectual abilities, attention, learning, memory, visual-spatial skills, visual-motor integration, language, motor coordination and executive functioning skills such as organization and planning. It may also address emotional, social and behavioral functioning. It can help in determining a child’s strengths and challenges and developing a treatment plan.

A neuropsychology evaluation typically takes 6-15 hours to complete, often over the course of several days. We have an extremely high demand, as we accept a wide range of insurances.

Be as open with your child as you would like about the evaluation. Many parents find it helpful to tell their child that this testing will help us determine how they learn best, and that this testing will help make school and home life as happy and successful as possible. It is also helpful to remind them that no one gets every question right and the most important thing is to try their best. There won’t be any scary machines or shots.