Autism news
Michael Ormsby, the boy who died because we didn't do enough
Nine-year-old Michael Ormsby died while in state respite care. The Herald Sun's Ruth Lamperd investigates what went wrong.
BEFORE Michael Ormsby got into mischief, his big brown eyes would dob him in. They would start smiling and people knew he was up to something.
He'd wander off, out of sight, chuckling at his plans. Delighted at how clever he was.
He liked getting into strife almost as much as he loved oranges, the smell of eucalyptus and being king of the castle.
What about the mental health of kids with intellectual disability?
The mental health problems of children with intellectual disabilities are largely undiagnosed and untreated. SriHarsha PVSS/Flickr, CC BY-NC-SA
Behavioural method is not an attempt to ‘cure’ autism
Julie with Jack in a film about Applied Behaviour Analysis.
Treetops School in Essex is a state school that uses ABA (Applied Behaviour Analysis) to educate children with autism. ABA has generated controversy and BBC4’s film, Autism: Challenging Behaviour, follows three-year-old Jack and four-year-old Jeremiah in their first term at the school.
ABA isn’t actually an autism treatment, although it can be used to make a positive difference. It can be applied at any age and not just with children with more severe autism. It’s also used in other areas of education and in health, and among other things good parenting uses its principles. ABA has been used to improve safety, train elite athletes and to increase productivity at work.
flawed NDIA approach implicitly blames parents for autism
The National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) adopted a flawed approach that blames parents implicitly for their child's autism and poor long-term outcomes. The NDIA is charged with funding early intervention for children with disability … and “disability” includes autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The NDIA's Operational Guideline – Access – Early Intervention Requirements can be downloaded here.
As well as describing the NDIA's eligibility criteria for ASD as gobbledygook (see here), community members regards the NDIA's approach to Early Intervention for children with ASD as flawed. The NDIA adopted the “Seven Key Principles” approach described in a document from a “Workgroup on Principles and Practices in Natural Environments” (see download page here)
There are strong feelings in the the ASD community that the principles the NDIS suggest/adopted are dangerous, misleading and offensive. The NDIA's early intervention principles ignore the relevant science and deny children effective treatment for their ASD. Clearly, the principles were written by someone/persons who are not informed about intervention, treatment or the science of intervention for ASD. Members of the ASD community are deeply disappointed that this document is used as the NDIA's official position on early intervention related to ASD.