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Health and medicine
Course: Health and medicine > Unit 9
Lesson 11: Neurodevelopmental disorders- What is Down syndrome?
- What is ADHD?
- Intro to neurodevelopment milestones
- Neurodevelopmental disorders: Sufficient and necessary causes
- What is cerebral palsy and what causes it?
- Types of cerebral palsy part 1 - Spastic
- Types of cerebral palsy part 2 - Dyskinetic and ataxic
- Diagnosing cerebral palsy
- Managing cerebral palsy
- What is autism spectrum disorder?
- What is autism spectrum disorder?
- What is Tourette's?
- Diagnosing autism spectrum disorder
- Managing autism spectrum disorder
- What is asperger syndrome?
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Managing autism spectrum disorder
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Want to join the conversation?
- With managing Autism, one of my relatives has Autism and struggles with communicating. She uses prompt cards that say, for example; help please, I need a break, restroom please ect. She is approaching her tween years and I was thinking since she is still young can't teaching her to communicate with words be better for her when she is an adult?(4 votes)
- Hi Britannia,
Unfortunately this is question that would be best aswered by a physician often a speech therapist would work to help them communicate. Personally I was born with mito disease when I was born I had been speech delayed it was quite difficult for my parents we had to use sign language. It wasn't until the age of three I entered a government funded program that provided speech therapy. Using Play based therapy and Art Therapy I finally found my own voice that help me open up and communicate. Also my mother worked hard to help me learn to read everyday which also help me further develop once I was in my teen years I had help from Child Life Specialists and pediatric program that help given me a voice to which this day I now do speaking events and advocate the importance of Child Life Services and the benefits of Play as being once who still experiences my own disability. Everybody has there own way of communicating unfortunately we look for what we understand but if we listen you would understand your realitive has there own language the question how do they speak to us?
Technology is definitely helping and perhaps accessibility and applications may offer her in adult years to communicate more.(6 votes)
- What medications would we use to combat some of the symptoms of autism spectre disorder, and how effective are they?(2 votes)
- Antipsychotics and other drugs that reduce anxiety, I suppose. But there are some symptoms that autistic people display that's actually helpful to them, such as repetitive movement(stimming).(5 votes)
- People who have a child with ASD, I always hear that they always give in it there child whenever it throughs a fit just to avoid it. Won't that hurt the child for when it is in its older years?(1 vote)
- If I understand correctly, your question is: why do parents of children with asd always give in if there kid gets mad?
I don't think this is true, but I can understand why it would look like that sometimes. When a child with autism throws a tantrum, it's usually because they feel like they're losing control (for example because their routine changed or because they are overstimulated). This is not a sign of resistance, but a sign that something's wrong. So no, giving in to the child is not a wrong approach, because the kid's not trying to get what they want; they're trying to get what they NEED (in the way you need water when you're thirsty). Children with autism have trouble communicating how they feel and what they need, so for a lot of kids this results in tantrums. Some children can learn better to communicate when they get older, some don't. This is not due to whether the parents gave in, but rather to the severity of the kid's autism, the kid's intelligence and the quality of help they get.(4 votes)
- Would creating a 'perfect' environment make it harder for the child as they grow up, when they realize the world is not always a structured or neat place, they can't always get what they want (like the same meals), sometimes things change, and other people may not be able to understand. Would it cause more problems for the child then? Of course I understand when they are young, having a stable environment is necessary ;)(0 votes)
- As an autistic person who did not grow up in an environment that was managed to be less stressful for me and as someone with a more than moderate understanding of ASD, I would say no. The point is with ASD is that these difficulties largely cannot be outgrown or learnt to ignore. Mild to moderate learning to use social skills is certainly possible for almost all with ASD, but sensory things like food and environmental stimuli cannot be 'taught' out of the person. No matter how many times you would try to make the person become accustomed to these things, there would be little more than mild improvements over a lifetime, and that type of thing is something that should really be the choice of the individual with ASD and on there own terms when they are old enough, otherwise the reaction would likely just be amplified due to an added negative association with the stimuli and would just cause completely unnecessary suffering in the individual.(3 votes)
Video transcript
- [Voiceover] So in this
video we're gonna talk about how we manage autism spectrum disorder. And in order for us to figure out how we might go about doing that, let's actually pull up the criteria here that we use to diagnose
autism spectrum disorder. So if we look at this,
the two main sort of signs that we need to see in someone in order to diagnose
autism spectrum disorder are trouble with
communication and interaction and restrictive, repetitive behaviors. And we can see here that
there are a few different ways that these problems could manifest, so this is what we would look for if we were trying to figure out if someone has autism spectrum disorder. And, since these are the
main sort of problems that someone with autism spectrum disorder can experience, well, it's these that we also want to focus on when we're thinking about managing
autism spectrum disorder. Now something that we need to keep in mind when we're thinking about managing autism spectrum disorder is that someone with autism spectrum disorder, they follow along a spectrum, right? So how much trouble they
have with communication and interaction and restricted
and repetitive behaviors, how much trouble they
have in these domains really varies a lot
between different people with autism spectrum disorder. So that means that we really want individualized management plans for different people with
autism spectrum disorder to make sure that the plans really address each person's strengths
and their symptoms, because this can really
vary depending on where along the autism spectrum
the person falls. So you might have picked up on the fact that I'm using the word manage here, rather than the word
treat, and that's because there isn't really a
cure for these troubles that someone with autism
spectrum disorder can experience. So instead what we want to focus on is managing these troubles
by trying to minimize how much they interfere with
the person's day to day life. And a big part of how we do that, especially when a child is younger, is we get the parents,
and other family members, and teachers involved in creating an ideal environment for the kid with autism spectrum disorder. And this ideal environment, what it is, is it's an environment that addresses these different troubles that someone with autism spectrum disorder can have. So let's take a look at
what this might look like. So in order to help a child
with autism spectrum disorder work on their communication
and interaction skills parents or teachers might make sure that the child has lots of
interactive playtime every day. So the teacher might
make sure that the child has time to interact
with his or her peers, maybe by working on classroom
activities together. These sorts of social activities are made a priority every day so that the child has
lots of opportunities to work on his or her communication and interaction skills in different ways. And at home, maybe the parents would really focus on making communication and interaction an important priority. Maybe they would practice
using nonverbal gestures and making sure that the child is able to use and understand these skills when they interact with the
parents or other family members. Now part of making sure that a kid with autism spectrum
disorder is able to thrive and work on their communication is making sure that they're comfortable in their environment. And since we know that kids
with autism spectrum disorder can be really set on routines
and have trouble with change what we often focus on in
managing autism spectrum disorder is making sure that the child has a really structured environment. So this might mean that
parents and teachers make sure that their routines,
like getting ready for school and after school activities and bedtimes and meals are always the same. Maybe this means that the child is in a smaller classroom so that they're able to get some more one
on one time with the teacher who can make sure that the day really follows a nice routine. And if the child has an activity
that they're really into, maybe something like playing with cars, well this might be implemented
into the daily schedule to make sure that the child has a routine that includes the activity
that they really enjoy. And parents and teachers would also likely identify any environmental stimuli, like lights, or sounds, or smells, that really overstimulate and bother the child with autism spectrum disorder, and to make sure that these are avoided. So all of these measures to
create a structured environment, this is done so that the child is able to function their best and be able to work on their communication
and interaction skills in an environment that
they're comfortable in. Now sometimes managing
autism spectrum disorder involves a few other measures to help deal with other disorders and
problems that can occur in kids with autism spectrum disorder. So, for example, sometimes kids with autism spectrum disorder have trouble with attention and hyperactivity. This might happen because they also have another disorder called attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or maybe this inattention
and hyperactivity occurs because they are
struggling with anxiety, which is actually another common problem for kids with autism spectrum disorder. Kids with autism spectrum
disorder are also at a higher risk of having
a few other conditions, like seizures, and sleep
trouble, and depression. So sometimes medications that help target and manage these other
symptoms and conditions can become a part of a management plan for autism spectrum disorder.