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Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD)

Autism or Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a profound and poorly understood pervasive developmental disorder that severely impairs a person’s ability to: communicate and interact socially and is restricted by repetitive behaviour Autism affects information processing in the brain by altering how nerve cells and their synapses connect and organise. How this occurs is still not well understood by the scientific community.

Children with ASD are typically normal in appearance and physically well developed. Parents usually notice signs in the first two years of their child’s life. Obvious symptoms gradually begin after the age of six months, become established by age two or three years and tend to continue through adulthood.

Autism is not distinguished not by a single symptom, but by a characteristic triad of symptoms: impairments in social interaction; impairments in communication; and restricted interests and repetitive behaviour. Other aspects, such as atypical eating, are also common but are not essential for diagnosis.

Although early behavioural or cognitive intervention can help children with ASD gain self-care, social and communication skills, not many children with autism live independently after reaching adulthood, though some are successful in doing so.

Biomedical interventions such as those used by doctors trained at the Pfieffer Treatment Centre and Defeat Autism Now give new hope to those with ASD.

Our experience at Learning Discoveries has shown that with effort, and time, the following multimodal interventions diet (low allergenic, gluten-free, dairy free), nutritional supplements (Vitamin B, Magnesium, Essential Fatty Acids and others as per pathological and metabolic findings of the individual), EEG biofeedback training (synonymous with ‘neurofeedback’), ABA training, speech therapy, Samonas Sound Therapy, inhibition of primitive reflexes and Sensory Integration methods are useful in ameliorating many of the symptoms of Autism.

For more information or to make an appointment please send an email or contact us on (02) 9637 9998 during business hours.

Papers by Rosemary
Autism and Autistic Spectrum Disorders – ASD

Further Reading Suggestions
Biofeedback
Exploring Autism – A Different World
The Interactive Metronome^®
Neurofeedback – EEG Biofeedback
Nutrition
Pervasive Developmental Disorders – PDD
Pyramid of Development, Learning and Wellbeing
Quantitative Electroencephalography – QEEG
QEEG and Neurofeedback
Remedial Methods for Reading Spelling and Comprehension
Samonas Sound Therapy
Sensory Motor Integration and Learning
Stages of Brain Development
The Paleolithic Diet