bmartinez asked this question on 5/4/2000:

what are some guidelines that a clinician can use to differentiate the types of pervasive developmental disorders

izzybelle gave this response on 5/5/2000:

http://www.autism-society.org/packages/pdd.html has great information with DSMIV diagnosis for autism, CDD, Asperger's, Rett's, and PDD Not Otherwise Specified. The DSMIV is what clinicians use to diagnos a patient with a pervasive developmental disorder.

http://www.patientcenters.com/autism/news/categories.html This is a site that breaks PDD down to it's categories and explains each one of them.

Pervasive Developmental Disorders: Finding a Diagnosis and Getting Help, by Mitzi Waltz, is a good book explaining PDD and how to cope with it.

There are many tests that are given to a child and many considerations before they are given a diagnosis of PDDNOS or any of PDDs subcategories. A sampling of these tests can be found here: http://www.patientcenters.com/autism/news/tests_diagnose.html

Hope this helps! Let me know if you wnat me to clarify any of this.