Early diagnosis and screening are key to treating autism: Expert

Doctors have failed to understand the various causes of autism but say that early rectification through clinical diagnosis will go a long way to reduce impact

Vasudha Zora I NT

Bengaluru: Autism, a neurodevelopmental disorder occurs at a young age of less than three years and requires a closer inspection when it comes to symptoms. Doctors have failed to understand the various causes of autism but say that early rectification, through clinical diagnosis should be carried out.

Persons with autism find it hard to be socially involved and cannot communicate like normal individuals are able to; they also have attention deficiencies and tend to enact repetitive actions or behavior or might get hyperactive which might not be acceptable for most living around them.

“Autism, better known as autistic disorder is just like many other mental health disorders, it is multi factorial, and has sub domains like high function autism, social communication disorders, repetitive behavior, disfigured speech and occupational disorders, ”Dr. Manamohan N, consultant psychiatrist , Sagar Hospitals said .

“There is a bandwidth of reasons for it to occur; it can be a genetic disorder, Intellectual disability, hereditary or can be acquired during pregnancy or during birth, or neurodevelopmental complications. So it is hard to synergize, making it hard to decide the causes”, he informed, adding that seizures are one of the comorbid conditions for some autistic people.

According to him, early diagnosis and screening are the foremost step into the process as this allows the treatment plan to be instilled early to conduct successful symptomatic build ups.

Occupational , speech, sensory Integration, social communication therapy should be done parallel with the treatment, considering most autistic children being hyperactive, the drugs bring them to normalcy, making the therapy furthermore effective, he opined.

“Parents of these children go through a lot of societal pressure and neglect which extends to these children, in a way banning them from the society, this can be curbed by covering the tracks of stigma. In order to bring their children back to normalcy, parents under the pressure are picking stem cell therapy,” Dr. Manamohan informed.

As per clinical records and literature, stem cell therapy is not significantly reactive in the treatment of Autism, in fact it is a procedure still under research so most patients are lab rats to many unethical practitioners, he explained. They are also known to extort money from innocent parents.

“Medicine is evidence based practice and right now there is no evidence for SCT. Practice based on belief is unethical, this might change but there needs to be a proper proof backing it, “he said, adding that conventional therapies are better, as they require one on one interaction with the child, then there are special schools offering different types of therapies.

A drug like methamphetamine helps in reducing hyperactivity and promotes concentration; resdon is known to help with behavioral changes. These drugs are administered because most of the times the child is not attentive enough to go on with the therapy, this helps them relax, he explained.

“The whole premise of treatment of Autism is to control the comorbid behavior and so, if it is anxiety, then we need to treat it before jumping to the next problem as many of them also go through complete mental shutdown. So therapy and medicine need to be worked on from a parallel angle”, he said.

“Sensory integration therapy helps in attaining the perceptions and sensations of the child. However it is challenging for children with autism”, he summed up.