Report to the ASNC Board
on the 2001 ASA Conference
by Mary Jo Croom
August 4th, 2001
It was my privilege to represent the Board at the 2001 National Conference on Autism in San Diego. The meeting presented opportunities to hear different views on various treatments and possible causes of autism, as well as to view presentations and displays of commercial businesses which address the medical, nutritional, educational, therapeutic and management needs of people with autism.
The first keynote speaker was Bernard Rimland, Ph.D., a psychologist in California who founded the Autism Society of America and runs the Autism Research Institute. It is his opinion that the increase in occurrence/diagnosis of autism is due to the medical establishment. He stated that in 1964, it was the consensus of many professionals that autism in a child was due to a refrigerator mother. Parents did not want to hear that. Therefore, diagnoses were often not made. He has positive feelings about the Lovaas method, and is very negative regarding medication use to treat symptoms. He does suspect the immunization-autism connection has merit, citing the increase of required immunizations in the US and the mercury used in their formulations. He is a proponent of vitamin B6 and magnesium supplementation, and of the DAN protocol (for alternative treatment of autism.)
Luke Tsai, MD, Professor of Psychiatry and Pediatrics at the University of Michigan, discussed modern pharmacological methods of treatment for the symptoms that often accompany autism-ADHD, schizophrenia, depression, seizures, aggression, anxiety, OCD, and tics. He stressed the importance of communication between caregiver, family, and medical professionals in the assessment and treatment of symptoms in order to improve the life/health of the individual. He warned against the lack of empirical scientific studies regarding the alternative treatments currently being used to treat autism.
A member of a panel on the DAN protocol, who is a physician, noted that autistic children detoxify less well than we do. It was this panel member's belief that mercury and thimerosol in vaccines may be involved in the etiology of autism. She stated that mercury, casein and gluten allergies, systemic yeast infections, and vitamin deficiencies or often present in her autistic patients. Additionally, essential fatty acids are not efficiently absorbed, and there are often amino acid, zinc, and enzyme deficiencies.
The keynote on Saturday was K. Nelson, MD, an epidemiologist from the National Institute of Health. She is involved in the study of the very early cell growth in the brains of autistic children, with an interest in prevention and treatment of autism. Among her comments were that males outnumber females 4-1 in autism diagnosis. Thirty percent of those with autism will experience seizure disorders. Generally, their heads and brains are large for their size. She stated that multiple genes are involved "interacting with the unknown" to cause autism, but that we did not need to understand the genes to improve treatment. She observed that problems with sleep, digestion, decreased response to pain, and hypersensitivity to other stimuli are very poorly studied and that the MMR is not a cause.
Jane Pickett from Princeton reported on post-mortem brain studies that need to be done. Current tests on living patients, including MRI's, do not give enough information to clearly understand the neuropathology of autism. She did state that vitamin B6 deficiency is rare. Life expectancy for persons with autism is shorter than average-minus 12.3 years for females and minus 6.3 for males. In children, the most frequent cause of death is injury and/or poisoning.
All of these presentations point to the desperate need for further research regarding the causes and treatments for autism and related conditions.
Respectfully submitted this fourth day of August, 2001,
Mary Jo Croom
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August 4th, 2001