What separates Neurodevelopmental Disabilities(NDD) from Developmental-Behavioral Pediatrics?

[boliver7]

Hello all! I am a current second-year medical student interested in pursuing the 6 year residency in Neurodevelopmental Disabilities. I have a younger sister with Down's syndrome and have taught swimming to children with special needs and worked for many years at summer camps for children with special needs. Working with kids with complex neurodevelopmntal disabilities and their families is my passion. During my med school studies, I have found great interest in neurology as well. I am starting this forum to garner more specifics and info on NDD specialty including: scope of practice salary and lifestyle. I have also considered DB Pediatrics and was wondering what the difference is between these 2 specialties in terms of procedures and tests performed and scope of practice? I hope you all are doing well and hanging in there during this time!

Warmest Regards,

Bobby O.

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[sliceofbread136]

With Neuro developmental you will be pedi neuro trained, developmental only you will not be.

 

[tantacles]

Hello all! I am a current second-year medical student interested in pursuing the 6 year residency in Neurodevelopmental Disabilities. I have a younger sister with Down's syndrome and have taught swimming to children with special needs and worked for many years at summer camps for children with special needs. Working with kids with complex neurodevelopmntal disabilities and their families is my passion. During my med school studies, I have found great interest in neurology as well. I am starting this forum to garner more specifics and info on NDD specialty including: scope of practice salary and lifestyle. I have also considered DB Pediatrics and was wondering what the difference is between these 2 specialties in terms of procedures and tests performed and scope of practice? I hope you all are doing well and hanging in there during this time!

Warmest Regards,

Bobby O.

When you say "procedures," what do you mean? In terms of tests, DBPeds, from my minimal experience, tends to do a lot of autism evaluation and manages medications for comorbid mental health conditions like anxiety and ADHD in children with developmental delay. They also do a lot of communication with schools in requesting appropriate accommodation. I can't speak to what the 6 year residency does as I haven't been exposed to it.

 

[boliver7]

When you say "procedures," what do you mean? In terms of tests, DBPeds, from my minimal experience, tends to do a lot of autism evaluation and manages medications for comorbid mental health conditions like anxiety and ADHD in children with developmental delay. They also do a lot of communication with schools in requesting appropriate accommodation. I can't speak to what the 6 year residency does as I haven't been exposed to it.

Thank you for the reply and all of this info! I misspoke by saying procedures and just meant tests? If you wouldn't mind me asking, how much would you happen to know about salary/lifestyle for DBP and whether it is majority academic or private practice? thanks!

 

[tantacles]

Thank you for the reply and all of this info! I misspoke by saying procedures and just meant tests? If you wouldn't mind me asking, how much would you happen to know about salary/lifestyle for DBP and whether it is majority academic or private practice? thanks!

DBPeds is paid pretty terribly from what I've seen, and far worse is the fact that you do a three year fellowship on top of a three year residency to be paid that badly. Most of the DBPeds physicians I've seen have been academic, and that worsens the pay divide. I'm not in this field, so I can't give you any concrete numbers.

Lifestyle wise, it's generally a M-F 9-5 type job without any call.

 

[girlofgrace7]

Developmental Pediatrics

Recently learned about this niche field and extremely interested. Anyone have first hand experience shadowing, rotating or researching in the field who has a little bit of insight into the speciality? I have a passion for working with children and teens with developmental disabilities. On the...

forums.studentdoctor.net

See above forum (on my cell phone so don't feel like trying to copy/paste my long answer). I'm a third year DBP fellow. Feel free to PM me with questions or if you want to talk mpre about this.

As far as salary, most positions in California right now are running 200-250k (academic jobs on the lower end). There's a lot of opportunities to work in academics or private practice. Lifestyle-wise, it's mostly weekends and holidays off and daytime hours only. There are rare programs who do inpatient consults or call, but they're few and far between (and usually light calls).

 

[girlofgrace7]

Medical specialty for someone interested in neurodevelopmental disorders

What medical specialty would be good for someone who’s interested in working with patients who have neurodevelopmental disorders, such as autism, learning disabilities, and intellectual disabilities? Neurology? Psychiatry? Pediatrics?

forums.studentdoctor.net

Meant to post this one as well since OP asked the same NDD/DBP question

 

[Crowder]

Hi -- I currently work in NDD at an academic center and finished fellowship training last year.

I would say the biggest difference between NDD and DBP is heavy focus on neurology in NDD (you can be boarded in pediatrics, neurology with special qualifications in child neurology, and neurodevelopmental disabilities). While not entirely a nuanced way of looking at it, NDD training is similar to doing child neurology, except with an additional fellowship on top.

My typical week involves developmental evaluation clinics (unspecified developmental delays, autism, cerebral palsy, etc.), child neurology clinic, and working in the NICU follow-up clinic. As far as procedures go, I do some tone management with botulinum toxins, but many NDD providers don't include that as part of their practice. I also spend a few weeks a year attending on the inpatient child neurology service (which also, not all NDD providers do).

In general, there can be a lot of flexibility in what your eventual NDD practice looks like, so things like lifestyle and salary can certainly vary depending on the kind of work you're interested in doing and what region of the country you live in.

 

[Appellatelove]

Hi -- I currently work in NDD at an academic center and finished fellowship training last year.

I would say the biggest difference between NDD and DBP is heavy focus on neurology in NDD (you can be boarded in pediatrics, neurology with special qualifications in child neurology, and neurodevelopmental disabilities). While not entirely a nuanced way of looking at it, NDD training is similar to doing child neurology, except with an additional fellowship on top.

My typical week involves developmental evaluation clinics (unspecified developmental delays, autism, cerebral palsy, etc.), child neurology clinic, and working in the NICU follow-up clinic. As far as procedures go, I do some tone management with botulinum toxins, but many NDD providers don't include that as part of their practice. I also spend a few weeks a year attending on the inpatient child neurology service (which also, not all NDD providers do).

In general, there can be a lot of flexibility in what your eventual NDD practice looks like, so things like lifestyle and salary can certainly vary depending on the kind of work you're interested in doing and what region of the country you live in.

Would you say there is adequate demand for your services? Are you able to find jobs anywhere? Are salaries similar to child neurology or gen peds?

 

[Crowder]

Would you say there is adequate demand for your services? Are you able to find jobs anywhere? Are salaries similar to child neurology or gen peds?

I'd say there is high demand for NDD trained providers in most/many places. Many graduates tend to stay in academic centers, but not all do. Since I wanted to continue to work doing multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary team-based care, I stayed in academics. While there aren't a lot of job postings, there can be many positions available if you ask around, since many places are in need of not only child neurologists, but also NDD providers.

Salaries can certainly vary depending on where you work and what kind of work you're interested in doing. I'd generally say they should be at least somewhere between gen peds and child neurology, but it really depends on what you're interested in doing (e.g. doing more child neuro than development should likely lead to compensation more along the lines of child neurology).