The Autistic Self-Advocacy Network’s Ari Ne’eman and Steven Kapp have released a policy brief: What Are the Stakes? An Analysis of the Impact of the DSM-5 Draft Autism Criteria on Law, Policy and Service Provision [PDF]. The full PDF brief can be found at bit.ly/DSM-5, and “…summarizes the legal and policy details of the program under discussion and attempts to identify the likely implications of the DSM-5’s outlined changes in the criteria for Autism Spectrum Disorder on eligibility, benefits, and access to services and legal rights.” The legal and policy areas in question are described, then followed by analyses of the proposed DSM-5 changes’ implications: Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (eligibility criteria) Impact of DSM-5 Shifts on Students with Disabilities Receiving Services Under IDEA ADA/504 Accommodations (guaranteeing non-discrimination re: disability in schools and in the workplace) Impact of DSM-5 Shifts on ADA/504 Protections Medicaid-Funded Developmental Disability Services Impact of the…
Month: June 2012
Emma Apple emmaapple.com The month of Autism Awareness and Acceptance — April — is more than a month past, but the campaigns continue. There’s Autism Acceptance Year, all those Facebook “Every Day is Autism Awareness Day at Our House” images that go around (which I love!), and there’s the ongoing efforts of self-advocates, parents, and allies who want you to be aware and — more importantly — accepting and understanding of what autism is and what it means for autistic individuals and their families. So, aside from Blue Hijab Day, here’s my contribution this year for Autism Acceptance. Five Ways to Accept Autistic Kids Be Patient. This really goes for kids of any variety. They have as much right as you to be out in the world and to take part fully in a world that will soon be theirs. Kids in general — but often especially kids with special…
This is one of four talks from the IMFAR 2012 symposium Anxiety in Autism Spectrum Disorders: From Biology to Treatment. The overall session theme: It’s clear that anxiety is a major problem for kids & adults on the autism spectrum. The onus on us to figure out how to treat it. Any errors or omissions in the summary below are on me. -SR Connor Puleo: Anxiety in Youth With and Without ASD: Commonalities and Variations What does anxiety look like in ASD and how good are we in measuring it? Are there things that seem to be different in terms of anxiety for children on the spectrum? How that might complicate measurement and methodology? Differential diagnosis in an ASD population is inherently challenging, there’s a lack of consensus how to go about it, and in terms of defining what is anxiety and what is ASD. What this means is that…