California Reports: Autism Epidemic Rages On - 886 New Children in 91 days
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SAR "Healing Autism:
Schafer Autism Report No Finer a Cause on the Planet"
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Tuesday, May 1, 2007 Vol. 11 No. 59
PUBLIC HEALTH
* California Reports: Autism Epidemic Rages On - 886 New Kids in 91 days
* Parent Groups Call for Increased Environmental Research on Autism at
IOM Workshop
RESEARCH
* Total Recall: Alzheimer's-like Mice Regain Memory
TREATMENT
* Can Oxygen Therapy Treat Autism?
* Mind-Reading Toys Wave of The Future
CARE
* Autism's Challenges Continue Into Adulthood
EVENTS
* NAA's Road to Recovery Walk Sunday!
* Keynote Address at the Autism One 2007 Conference
PUBLIC HEALTH
California Reports: Autism Epidemic Rages On - 886 New Children in 91 days
From California autism advocate Rick Rollens.
According to information released last week by California's Department
of Developmental Services (DDS), during the 91 day period that was the first
quarter of 2007 (Q 1), 886 new children with a professional diagnosis of
full syndrome DSM IV autism, NOT including PDD, NOS, Asperger's Syndrome or
any other autism spectrum disorder were added to California's developmental
services system.
There were a total of 1570 total new intakes during Q 1 2007 which
included children with autism, cerebral palsy, mental retardation, epilepsy,
and a myriad of rare genetic conditions such as Fragile X, Down's Syndrome,
etc. Of the 1570 total new intakes, 886 or 56% were full syndrome autism
cases. The 886 new intakes during that 91 day period represents the second
highest number of new intakes for a quarter reporting period in the 38 year
history of California's developmental services system. On average,
California is currently adding 10 new children a day, seven days a week with
full syndrome autism to its system. In 1971, California included autism as
a qualifying condition to it's developmental services system. During the 16
year period from 1971 through 1987, California had a total caseload of
roughly 2700 persons with autism.
During the past nine months alone, from July 2006 to April 2007,
California added roughly 2700 new cases. What use to take 16 years in
caseload growth now takes 9 months! Twenty years ago in 1987 there were
2700 persons with autism in the system, today 20 years later, there are
nearly 34,000....92% born after 1980, 84% under the age of 21, and 78% under
the age of 18.
We are still waiting for the missing 14,000+ adults with autism that
should be in our system if there has not been a real increase in autism to
show up now that we know what autism looks like (HaHa). Still no sign of
them. The fact is, they do not exist. In California's system today, less
then 2 out of 10 persons with autism are 22 years of age or older, the
remaining 8 1/2 out of 10 are between the ages of 3 and 21.
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Parent Groups Call for Increased Environmental Research on Autism at IOM
Workshop
PRNewswire - The National Autism Association (NAA) and SafeMinds
(Sensible Action for Ending Mercury Induced Neurological Disorders) urged
scientists working on autism to focus on environmental factors including
vaccines at an April 18-19 Institute of Medicine (IOM) workshop. The
workshop, titled "Autism and the Environment: Challenges and Opportunities
for Research," was planned by a committee representing government agencies,
academic institutions, and autism organizations. Planning committee members
included NAA board member Laura Bono and Safe Minds vice president Mark
Blaxill. Both are parents of children diagnosed with autism.
In discussing the most promising areas of autism research, past
performance by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the
role of vaccines in the development of autism were addressed. Ms. Bono
presented "Perspectives of the Advocacy Community," stating, "We believe the
CDC has a performance and credibility problem. Their failure to declare an
epidemic beginning with the 1989 birth cohort, to study the time trend data,
or to examine the toxic and viral body burdens of children are why we are
here today -- over 15 years too late."
The two-day meeting concluded with a panel discussion on
"Public-Private Partnerships" among scientists and advocates. Panelists
included NAA board member Lyn Redwood, RN, MSN and Sallie Bernard, executive
director of SafeMinds, who urged federal agencies to allocate significantly
more to the environmental side of the "gene-environment" equation and to
reach out to parents who are the stakeholders in this disease. "We need the
guidance of parents in identifying the most promising areas of investigation
to find meaningful ways of improving the lives of those with autism now and
to prevent its occurrence in the future," stated Ms. Redwood.
Many attendees, including parents, physicians, and researchers,
expressed optimism following the workshop that autism research might now be
shifting to more fruitful areas examining toxin and pathogen effects. Sue
Swedo of NIH and Irva Hertz-Picciotto of the MIND Institute reported that
major autism research databases will incorporate exposure histories
including immunization records. David Schwartz, director of the National
Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), suggested that
applications for developing exposure and body burden testing methods for
autism be made to the NIEHS's Exposure Biology Program, part of its
Gene-Environment Initiative. As part of his power point presentation, Dr.
Larry Needham of the CDC's National Center for Environmental Health
listed the mercury-based vaccine preservative thimerosal among five other
chemicals linked to autism spectrum disorders.
"I see it as a turning point," said Dr. William Raub, science adviser
to the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services. Dr. Raub said the
workshop would give "a higher profile" to the possibility that environmental
agents are contributing to the development of autism.
EVIDENCE OF HARM DISCUSSION LIST HEATS UP
AS MERCURY LINK TO AUTISM QUESTION SPREADS
>> PAPERBACK BOOK NOW OUT - CHECK AMAZON.COM
An Evidence of Harm email discussion list has
been created in response to the growing interest
in the book and the issues it chronicles. Now over
1,700 subscribers. Here is where to subscribe
(no cost): http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EOHarm/
. . .
RESEARCH
Total Recall: Alzheimer's-like Mice Regain Memory
M.I.T. researchers find that certain environments prompt lost memory to
return and determine the biological mechanism behind the phenom
From Scientific American. http://tinyurl.com/2kkyt4
A study, published by Massachusetts Institute of Technology scientists
in the online edition of Nature, reports the successful restoration of
memory in mice by administering medicine that mimics the memory-boosting
effects of enriched environmental conditions. This class of drugs, the
researchers say, could lead to new treatment options for Alzheimer's
disease.
Li-Huei Tsai, a professor of neuroscience in M.I.T.'s department of
Brain and Cognitive Sciences and the study's senior author, notes that for
decades neuroscientists have known that living conditions with lots of novel
stimuli improve rodent memory. Using a flexible mouse model, her team set
out to determine whether anything could be done to restore memory "after a
significant number of neurons are lost in the brain."
Tsai's group manipulated the gene for the protein p25, which has been
implicated in several neurodegenerative diseases, so that it could be easily
switched on and off. When the protein was on, the mice typically accrued
nerve and brain damage and eventually forgot information they had recently
learned. Tsai says the mouse model allowed researchers to differentiate
between learning impairment and long-term memory loss.
"In most [Alzheimer's] studies, people just look at learning
impairment," she says. "In our models, we can really control the timing in
which neurodegeneration will happen" to observe loss of memory as well as
learning ability.
To establish whether environmental changes could improve learning
ability the team put mice with significant neuronal damage in one of two
types of cages. One was a standard, single mouse cage with bedding, food and
water, and the other was a much larger design in which several mice were
grouped together. The latter group were provided with a set of props changed
daily, such as running wheels, tunnels and umbrella-shaped toys of different
colors. Sure enough, mice that lived in stimulating environments performed
better on learning tasks involving associations and spatial reasoning.
The researchers then trained mice to do several activities and respond
to stimuli, such as a shock when they were in certain cages. A mouse
repeatedly put in a shock box would typically freeze as soon as it was
placed inside-a signal that it was afraid and, therefore, remembered being
zapped in this particular cage.
After four weeks of such training, researchers reactivated the p25
gene in the mice for six weeks and then tested them to see if they recalled
their shocking experiences. They did not.
They then segregated the mice again: One set spent the next four weeks
in an enriched environment, the others lived in unadorned, standard cages.
When they were returned to the shock cage after the four-week period, the
nonenriched mice still had no idea what might be in store, whereas the
stimulated rodents became paralyzed with fear, indicating they did.
"That result directly suggests that the memories are not really lost
in the first place," says Tsai. "More likely, those long-term memories
become inaccessible after a significant number of neurons are lost." When
researchers dissected the brains of the environmentally enriched mice (as
well as those who also suffered neurodegeneration, but had not lived in
plush environs), they saw the same extent of damage done to hippocampus and
cortex-two brain regions intimately linked to learning and memory.
"While environmental enrichment didn't seem to significantly influence
the number of neurons [that were damaged]," explains Tsai, "it does induce
the growth of dendrites and high numbers of synapses," both of which are
neuronal structures that underlie how brain cells communicate with one
another. In other words, Tsai says, the memories are not actually lost,
rather neuronal damage breaks many of the retrieval pathways in the brain.
David Sweatt, chairman of neurobiology department at the University of
Alabama at Birmingham, says that the new paper provides evidence for a
phenomenon many neuroscientists believed to be impossible: lost memories
could be accessed once again. "It's a proof of principle that memories that
were unavailable for recall might be recaptured and made available for
recall," he explains. "The fact that it can happen at all is pretty
profound."
. . .
TREATMENT
Can Oxygen Therapy Treat Autism?
By Kirsten Scharnberg for the Chicago Tribune
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660216600,00.html
HONOLULU - Kalma Wong has tried almost everything for her two autistic
children: special diets, intense behavioral therapies, flying in experts
from the U.S. mainland at exorbitant costs.
Some efforts have yielded modest success. Others have done next to
nothing.
But like many other parents of the more than 500,000 children that the
Centers for Disease Control estimates to be autistic in the U.S., Wong has
vowed to keep trying until she pinpoints the treatment that most helps her
kids.
Her latest attempt is one of the most long-shot therapies yet, a
protocol some doctors praise but that others declare to be a waste of time
that gives desperate parents false hope and exploits them financially.
It is called hyperbaric oxygen therapy, a treatment in which pure
oxygen is delivered to patients confined to pressurized chambers for an hour
a day for several weeks. The theory is that extreme doses of oxygen -
essentially the same kind of treatment used for decades to cure divers with
decompression illness - would spur dormant or damaged neurons in the brain
to become reinvigorated or even transformed.
In the case of children with autism, considered the fastest-growing
developmental disability in the U.S. today, the new treatment is claimed to
have produced some stunning results: transforming nonverbal children into
fluent speakers; helping children hypersensitive to outside stimuli become
calm enough to attend public schools; changing kids once averse to any
personal interaction or touching into affectionate toddlers.
"I don't know what to expect from this," Wong said, "but the minute I
heard about the upcoming trial, I called and got my kids on the list. I feel
like it's worth a shot."
Her reaction is just what some autism experts fear.
"I understand that what all parents want is to be able to look back
and say they did everything they possibly could to help their child," said
Dr. Tina Iyama, professor of pediatrics at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison and an expert on autism. "That's why they are trying all
these experimental new treatments. But ... there is absolutely no reason to
think that improving oxygen levels in a child with autism will be helpful."
The debate over hyperbaric oxygen therapy, or HBOT, illustrates the
fault lines over autism, a disorder that the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention estimates afflicts as many as 1 in every 150 children in America.
Because there is no medical consensus on what causes autism, there also is
little agreement on how best to treat it.
Some doctors who believe that the components of childhood vaccines,
such as mercury, have been responsible for many cases of autism advocate
detoxification programs in which children take chemicals that bind with
metals in the body and force them out through urine. Others promote
gluten-free diets under the theory that autistic children have high levels
of a certain type of yeast in their digestive tracts. And then there are the
proponents of HBOT, which has gained a following among parents who claim it
has helped children with neurological problems, including cerebral palsy,
traumatic brain injury, encephalitis and, most recently, autism.
Inside an office in an industrial section of Honolulu is the
Hyperbaric Medicine Center. The first stop on the tour by Maryellen Markley,
its patient care coordinator, is in front of two color brain scans that she
said show the profound results of HBOT. The first scan, she said, reveals
that an autistic child had decreased blood flow and profound
neuro-inflammation before the oxygen therapy.
"Look at how much has changed in the second scan," Markley said,
pointing. "Better blood flow, less inflammation, more connections between
the two sides of the brain. This child, a 6-year-old, was completely
nonverbal since the age of one-and-a-half, and after 66 hours of hyperbaric
oxygen therapy was talking again."
Markley said she has treated more than 30 autistic children with HBOT
and "every single child ... had consistent quality-of-life improvements."
The improvements, she said, were more pronounced in kids most afflicted by
the characteristics of autism: the repetitive behaviors and the impairments
in sensory perception, social interaction and communication.
Critics argue that no studies have been done that use scientific
models such a double-blind testing. They caution that the treatment has been
tried only on a handful of autistic children nationwide, not nearly enough
to draw valid conclusions.
"They are making extraordinary claims without extraordinary evidence,"
Iyama said.
Evidence is exactly what supporters of HBOT are hoping to get in the
coming months. Beginning in May, the Honolulu clinic, along with about 20
hyperbaric oxygen clinics across the U.S., will launch a formal study into
how autistic children respond to the therapy. About 400 children will be
studied, and the results are to be evaluated by the National Institutes for
Health.
Other studies are under way. One of the biggest is a federally funded
study on the effects of HBOT on children with cerebral palsy at
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio.
One group watching the outcomes of these studies is the Undersea and
Hyperbaric Medical Society, a non-profit group of doctors that investigates
scientific claims linked to HBOT. Thus far the group has been skeptical of
using HBOT to help neurological conditions such as autism or cerebral palsy.
"If we just had the evidence, we'd be happy to support it. But it just
isn't there," Dr. Donald Chandler, executive director of the UHMS, has said
in statements regarding the therapy.
As unproven as HBOT is for treating autism, it is widely accepted in
other fields of medicine, where it has been used for decades. It is so
well-documented to work in the treatment of slow-healing wounds, burns,
carbon monoxide poisoning, intercranial abscesses, gangrene and the stubborn
sores associated with diabetes that many insurance companies include HBOT in
their list of reimbursable medical expenses.
One insurance reimbursement case, in Georgia, is pointed to most
frequently by supporters of HBOT. The case involved Jimmy Freels, a child
with such severe cerebral palsy, a neurological disorder that affects body
movement and muscle coordination, that he was essentially a quadriplegic.
With HBOT, the boy improved to such a degree that he could speak, swim,
attend public school and play wheelchair football, according to court
testimony. In court, brain scans - similar to those Markley shows of autism
patients who have undergone HBOT - showed significant improvement in Jimmy's
blood flow and metabolism in portions the brain.
A state judge ordered Georgia Medicaid to cover HBOT for Jimmy, saying
the evidence had showed the therapy had helped.
The treatment is far from cheap. HBOT can range from about $180 to
$800 per hour.
The therapy is not alleged by most of its critics to be dangerous. It
carries, they say, a rare risk of prompting seizures, but most seem to
believe it is simply a waste of time and money.
"My fear is that we're going to waste tax dollars and good time and
money chasing quirky ideas," said Iyama, who heads an autism clinic in
Madison. "The only effective treatment for autism is educational and
behavioral treatment The rest is just wishful thinking."
Major medical groups have backed this sentiment. The American Academy
of Pediatrics several years ago issued a statement dismissing most
alternative-medicine treatments for autism.
Indeed, HBOT has a history of being oversold as something of a
cure-all. The most notorious case came in the 1920s. A doctor in Cleveland
built a compression chamber where long lines of patients went in hopes of
curing everything from syphilis to cancer. When the treatment failed, the
chamber was torn down and sold for scrap metal.
Iyama fears that parents deeply saddened and frustrated by their
children's condition will make bad decisions about experimental therapies.
She emphasized that the most accepted method for treating autistic children
is the kind of intensive behavior therapy that requires at least 35 hours of
work each week with an autistic child. She fears that some parents are drawn
to treatments that promise faster results.
"I had one mother who told me her mom was willing to mortgage the
family home in order to fund hyperbaric oxygen therapy for the child," Iyama
said.
Wong, whose two children will begin HBOT in May, isn't putting her
hopes on any one thing. She continues to immerse her children in behavioral
therapies, to work with national autism educational experts and adhere to a
rigorous gluten-free diet.
"The bottom line," Wong said, "is that when you are the parent of an
autistic child, you learn to appreciate the treatments that yield even
subtle changes."
. . .
Mind-Reading Toys Wave of The Future
Toys could boost mental focus and help kids with attention deficit
hyperactivity disorder, autism and mood disorders.
http://www.todaysthv.com/printfullstory.aspx?storyid=45111
San Jose, CA -- A convincing twin of Darth Vader stalks the beige
cubicles of a Silicon Valley office, complete with ominous black mask, cape
and light saber.
But this is no chintzy Halloween costume. It's a prototype, years in
the making, of a toy that incorporates brain wave-reading technology.
Behind the mask is a sensor that touches the user's forehead and reads
the brain's electrical signals, then sends them to a wireless receiver
inside the saber, which lights up when the user is concentrating. The player
maintains focus by channeling thoughts on any fixed mental image, or
thinking specifically about keeping the light sword on. When the mind
wanders, the wand goes dark.
Engineers at NeuroSky Inc. have big plans for brain wave-reading toys
and video games. They say the simple Darth Vader game - a relatively crude
biofeedback device cloaked in gimmicky garb - portends the coming of more
sophisticated devices that could revolutionize the way people play.
Technology from NeuroSky and other startups could make video games
more mentally stimulating and realistic. It could even enable players to
control video game characters or avatars in virtual worlds with nothing but
their thoughts.
Adding biofeedback to "Tiger Woods PGA Tour," for instance, could mean
that only those players who muster Zen-like concentration could nail a put.
In the popular first-person shooter "Grand Theft Auto," players who become
nervous or frightened would have worse aim than those who remain relaxed and
focused.
NeuroSky's prototype measures a person's baseline brain-wave activity,
including signals that relate to concentration, relaxation and anxiety. The
technology ranks performance in each category on a scale of 1 to 100, and
the numbers change as a person thinks about relaxing images, focuses
intently, or gets kicked, interrupted or otherwise distracted.
The technology is similar to more sensitive, expensive equipment that
athletes use to achieve peak performance. Koo Hyoung Lee, a NeuroSky
co-founder from South Korea, used biofeedback to improve concentration and
relaxation techniques for members of his country's Olympic archery team.
"Most physical games are really mental games," said Lee, also chief
technology officer at San Jose-based NeuroSky, a 12-employee company founded
in 1999. "You must maintain attention at very high levels to succeed. This
technology makes toys and video games more lifelike."
Boosters say toys with even the most basic brain wave-reading
technology - scheduled to debut later this year - could boost mental focus
and help kids with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, autism and mood
disorders.
But scientific research is scant. Even if the devices work as
promised, some question whether people who use biofeedback devices will be
able to replicate their relaxed or focused states in real life, when they're
not attached to equipment in front of their television or computer.
Elkhonon Goldberg, clinical professor of neurology at New York
University, said the toys might catch on in a society obsessed with
optimizing performance - but he was skeptical they'd reduce the severity of
major behavioral disorders.
"These techniques are used usually in clinical contexts. The gaming
companies are trying to push the envelope," said Goldberg, author of "The
Wisdom Paradox: How Your Mind Can Grow Stronger As Your Brain Grows Older."
"You can use computers to improve the cognitive abilities, but it's an art."
It's also unclear whether consumers, particularly American kids, want
mentally taxing games.
"It's hard to tell whether playing games with biofeedback is more fun
- the company executives say that, but I don't know if I believe them," said
Ben Sawyer, director of the Games for Health Project, a division of the
Serious Games Initiative. The think tank focuses in part on how to make
computer games more educational, not merely pastimes for kids with dexterous
thumbs.
The basis of many brain wave-reading games is electroencephalography,
or EEG, the measurement of the brain's electrical activity through
electrodes placed on the scalp. EEG has been a mainstay of psychiatry for
decades.
An EEG headset in a research hospital may have 100 or more electrodes
that attach to the scalp with a conductive gel. It could cost tens of
thousands of dollars.
But the price and size of EEG hardware is shrinking. NeuroSky's
"dry-active" sensors don't require gel, are the size of a thumbnail, and
could be put into a headset that retails for as little as $20, said NeuroSky
CEO Stanley Yang.
Yang is secretive about his company's product lineup because of a
nondisclosure agreement with the manufacturer. But he said an international
toy manufacturer plans to unveil an inexpensive gizmo with an embedded
NeuroSky biosensor at the Japan Toy Association's trade show in late June. A
U.S. version is scheduled to debut at the American International Fall Toy
Show in October.
"Whatever we sell, it will work on 100 percent or almost 100 percent
of people out there, no matter what the condition, temperature, indoor or
outdoors," Yang said. "We aim for wearable technology that everyone can put
on and go without failure, as easy as the iPod."
Researchers at NeuroSky and other startups are also building
prototypes of toys that use electromyography (EMG), which records twitches
and other muscular movements, and electrooculography (EOG), which measures
changes in the retina.
While NeuroSky's headset has one electrode, Emotiv Systems Inc. has
developed a gel-free headset with 18 sensors. Besides monitoring basic
changes in mood and focus, Emotiv's bulkier headset detects brain waves
indicating smiles, blinks, laughter, even conscious thoughts and unconscious
emotions. Players could kick or punch their video game opponent - without a
joystick or mouse.
"It fulfills the fantasy of telekinesis," said Tan Le, co-founder and
president of San Francisco-based Emotiv.
The 30-person company hopes to begin selling a consumer headset next
year, but executives would not speculate on price. A prototype hooks up to
gaming consoles such as the Nintendo Wii, Sony PlayStation 3 and Microsoft
Xbox 360.
Le, a 29-year-old Australian woman, said the company decided in 2004
to target gamers because they would generate the most revenue - but
eventually Emotiv will build equipment for clinical use. The technology
could enable paralyzed people to "move" in virtual realty; people with
obsessive-compulsive disorders could measure their anxiety levels, then
adjust medication accordingly.
The husband-and-wife team behind CyberLearning Technology LLC took the
opposite approach. The San Marcos-based startup targets doctors, therapists
and parents of adolescents with autism, impulse control problems and other
pervasive developmental disorders.
CyberLearning is already selling the SmartBrain Technologies system
for the original PlayStation, PS2 and original Xbox, and it will soon work
with the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. The EEG- and EMG-based biofeedback
system costs about $600, not including the game console or video games.
Kids who play the race car video game "Gran Turismo" with the
SmartBrain system can only reach maximum speed when they're focused. If
attention wanes or players become impulsive or anxious, cars slow to a chug.
CyberLearning has sold more than 1,500 systems since early 2005. The
company hopes to reach adolescents already being treated for behavior
disorders. But co-founder Lindsay Greco said the budding niche is
unpredictable.
"Our biggest struggle is to find the target market," said Greco, who
has run treatment programs for children with attention difficulties since
the 1980s. "We're finding that parents are using this to improve their own
recall and focus. We have executives who use it to improve their memory,
even their golf."
. . .
CARE
Autism's Challenges Continue Into Adulthood
By Erica Harbatkin for the Home News Tribune Online.
http://tinyurl.com/2ktkra
Federal law mandates that school districts provide autistic children
with the education and services they need. But once those children graduate
from high school or turn 21, their parents are essentially on their own.
"You get pretty good services until you turn 21, and then in some
cases your 21st birthday is like the day you stepped off the edge of the
earth," said Sandra Harris, executive director and founder of the Douglass
Developmental Disability Center at Rutgers University.
The Douglass center started one of the first adult programs in New
Jersey when it opened about a decade ago. Participants work with a job coach
for part of the day and engage in recreational activities for the rest of
the day.
Twenty adults are in the program, ranging in age from their early 20s
to their late 30s. But people don't graduate from this program - and there
aren't many others in Middlesex County.
"A big part of that has to do with the fact that the (state Division
of Developmental Disabilities) gets nowhere near the resources necessary for
adults," Harris said. "It's not that they're stingy or ungiving - it's that
we, the people of New Jersey, are not adequately funding them." So the
burden ends up exactly where it began - with the parents.
Lost at Home
Kimberly Edwards, the director of information and advocacy for the New
Jersey Center for Outreach and Services for the Autism Community, recently
spoke to the mother of a 25-year-old son with autism. He graduated from high
school at age 21, and now he's sitting at home, lost.
"He gets upset because he doesn't have anywhere to go; there's nothing
for him to do," Edwards said. "There is a program in the next county over,
but there's no transportation to get him there.
"But that's what happens. School ends, and the adults end up sitting
around, twiddling their thumbs, when they could be productive members of
society."
Lori Shery is one of the lucky ones. Her 20-year-old son, Adam, is
getting his associate degree from Middlesex County College and plans to
eventually get a master's degree in library science.
He was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome in 1996.
"In many ways, I've overcome the Asperger's," Adam Shery said.
"There's no cure, per se, but I have overcome many of the challenges."
Adam Shery always did fine in school - he was an honor student at J.P.
Stevens High School in Edison and was academically prepared to go straight
to a four-year college.
But social life was a struggle. He didn't learn to carry on a
conversation until age 11, and ever since he's been working to catch up.
Couldn't Converse
"At one time, I literally had no idea how to converse with another
individual," he said, adding that he had social-skills training when he was
10. "Since then, I gradually improved in that respect, and today I can have
a full two-way conversation with another individual."
For Dave Harris, also a 20-year-old student at Middlesex County
College, the social aspect came a little easier. Instead he struggles with
the academic side - staying on task, keeping things organized, finding
solutions to unexpected problems.
"Some of the people with Asperger's are really gifted in certain areas
(such as academics), but he's got the nonverbal learning disability piece of
it," said his mother, Jill Harris.
+ Read more: http://tinyurl.com/2ktkra
. . .
EVENTS
NAA's Road to Recovery Walk Sunday!
Please join us in Boston, MA, on Sunday, May 6th! at Castle Island,
William J Day Blvd South Boston as we walk to raise funds for our Helping
Hand program and research that will really help our kids!
The first 200 walkers with donations totaling $75 or more will receive
a free Road to Recovery Walk T-Shirt at the registration table. Please
bring a record of your online donations, cash and checks made out to NAA
with you. Registration opens at 8:30am. Walk begins at 10:00am.
The course will be approximately 2 1/4 miles. There will be a water
stop at the mid-way point. Starting Point at Pleasure Bay (at the causeway
to the SugarBowl).
. . .
Keynote Address at the Autism One 2007 Conference
Saturday, May 26, 2007 7:00 am CT www.autismone.org
Martha Herbert, MD, PhD is an Assistant Professor of Neurology at
Harvard Medical School, a pediatric neurologist at the Massachusetts General
Hospital in Boston and at the Center for Child and Adolescent Development of
Cambridge Health Alliance and a member of the Harvard MIT MGH Martinos
Center for Biomedical Imaging.
Next Steps With The New Autism Paradigm: Science, Infrastructure And
Horizons
The framing of autism as a whole body condition deriving from
gene-environment-epigenetic interactions with treatment and recovery
possibilities is advancing on multiple fronts. New science is being
published and more is on the way to substantiate this approach. Parents,
practitioners, and researchers are coalescing to organize more coherent
infrastructure to support and advance this work. The heterogeneity of the
condition along with deep physiological overlaps with many other disorders
reveal limitations in standard models of experimental design and clinical
trials, but also suggests that powerful alliances may become possible in
rising to these challenges.
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