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The Invisible Struggle: Autism Diagnosis in Immigrant Families
According to Constance Baker Motley, the first Black woman elected to the New York State Senate in 1964, “something which we think is impossible now is not impossible in another decade.” About 11 years back when I was graduating as a Doctor of Social Work, I held similar thoughts for the...
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“It’s Special” Podcast with Tracey Spencer Walsh, Esq. and Cecelia McCarton, MD
Tracey Spencer Walsh is the Founder and Chief Litigation Strategist of Spencer Walsh Law, PLLC and is also the creator and host of the podcast, “It’s Special.” The “It’s Special” podcast takes a vast amount of information in the realm of special needs - sometimes too...
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Rates of Autism Increase, But Numbers Don’t Paint the Full Picture
Headlines over the past 20 years have signaled ever-increasing recognition of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Now, in a new article published in Autism, our team describes our own estimates of how many children across Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s (CHOP) Primary Care Network have been...
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Autism Prevalence Higher in CDC’s ADDM Network: Improvements Being Made in Identifying Children with Autism Early
One in 44 (2.3%) 8-year-old children have been identified with autism spectrum disorder according to an analysis of 2018 data published today in CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) Surveillance Summaries. This is higher than the previous estimate published in March 2020, which...
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A Shift Towards Better Understanding and Improving the Lives of Girls and Women With ASD
It has been widely established that females are less frequently diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) than males. On average, prevalence of ASD is four times higher in males than in females (Baio et al., 2018). This ratio appears to be an inaccurate representation of prevalence by...
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Autism Science Foundation Announces Expansion of the Autism Sisters Project – 3 New Grants Awarded to Search for the Female Protective Effect
The Autism Science Foundation (ASF), a not-for-profit organization dedicated to catalyzing innovative autism research, announced the launch of three new multi-year research grants to expand the Autism Sisters Project at the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) and the Broad Institute in...
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Sex Differences in Autism: A Treatment Perspective
Sex differences in prevalence have been reported in several mental disorders. For example, the prevalence of trichotillomania, anorexia nervosa, and bulimia nervosa are reported to be as much as 10 times more common in girls than boys (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). By contrast, autism...
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What Happened to All the Females with Autism Spectrum Disorders?
The concept of an autistic disorder is generally accepted to have originated with Leo Kanner and his classic 1943 account of ‘Autistic Disorders of Affective Contact’ (Kanner, 1943). He described 11 children with what would now be regarded as severe autism. Three of these 11 were girls, and as...
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Examining the Impact of H.R. 3054: The Global Autism Assistance Act of 2013
The Global Autism Assistance Act of 2013, known as H.R. 3054, is designed to provide training and education to teachers in developing countries with intervention and prevention treatment plans for children diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (GovTrack, 2014). It was introduced by Republican...
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Advocating for a Student-Centered Approach in Special Education
Autism Spectrum Disorder is on the rise. Autism Spectrum Disorder is on the rise? While pondering over information found on the National Institute of Mental Health website (www.nimh.nih.gov), one cannot help but fluctuate between statement and question. The latest edition of the diagnostic manual...
