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Autism Awareness Month - Health Tips
Teissy Meza, Ph.D., Program Director, Autism Center, St. Joseph's Regional Medical Center, speaks about autism, and what to look for in your child and how to help them.
April is autism awareness month. Autism is 1 of 3 pervasive developmental disorders. Clinical features of autism include speech and language deficit whether expressing language or nonverbal communication. Look for signs such as babbling, utilization of single or two word phrases, communication quality and indication of needs.
In addition if you see your child likes to or tends to play alone without involving you in his/her play this is an area of concern. If your child demonstrates very rigid repetitive behaviors that don't seem to serve very much of a function such as spinning, rocking and or head banging and your interruption of their behavior tends to make the child very upset to the point where they cannot be comforted by you or by themselves it is a concern.
If your child is younger than 3 they can get services through an early intervention program, if older than 3 they can receive treatment through a school based program. The earlier we can diagnose and intervene with the appropriate services, the better the prognosis.
