Can one hour per week of therapy lead to lasting changes in young children with autism?
Vismara, Colombi and Rogers have published a new study in Autism, vol 13 (1) giving parents of young children with autism 1 hour of education for 12 weeks. This program was manulized using Early Strat Denver Model. The manual are in preparation, and it will be great to see it published.
This manual and model fuses development, relationship and behavioral methosds as the Denver Model in other settings, and according to the investigators focusing on all areas of development for toddlers with autism. As this study was done with children from 10 – 36 months.
This study showed that a 12 week 1 hour parent program, with follow-up sessions successfully teached parents of young children with autism, increased functional verbal utterances, and increase imitative behaviors with the toddlers.
This is a promising study as it targets very young children with autism, and as the age of diagnosis drops investigating interventions for toddlers is essential, especially for the children below 24 months.
The intensity and expenses of autism treatment are great, and this study points in direction of more time efficient and less expensive treatments. This may lead to more children getting effective treatment. But as this is a pilot, more data is needed, specially on long term results.
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