Autism

[sherrardk]

Is anyone here an 'expert' on Autism and autistic tendencies? I have started looking on the net but it is all a bit confusing. thanks.

[cazzz1975]

not an expert but certainly knowledgable on autism

[Buenchico]

I can't help directly but I'll try help you to to filter your web search down to the most informative links.

A useful video plus lots of information from the various links ('Symptoms', 'Causes', Diagnosis', etc):
http://www.nhs.uk/con...ges/Introduction.aspx

Loads of information:
http://www.autism.org.uk/
(I suggest that the 'All about diagnosis' link might be particularly helpful to you)

Chris

[sherrardk]

Right - the boy is 3 1/2 and doesn't speak. He has had speech therapy and attended a language group (but I took him out as I didn't feel it was appropriate for him). When he is tired he will say things 'night night Daddy, I love you' and yesterday he said 'halloween' when he saw the stuff in Asda. He is probably the brightest of our children and I would genuinely say if he wasn't very bright. He loves puzzles (of around 100 pieces) and music (he likes strong beats and will mark the time using his finger or hands).

[cazzz1975]

nothing is screaming autism at the moment, more developmental delay. with autism there are 3 criteria that have to be impaired.

http://www.devdis.com/asd.html

[sherrardk]

Thanks for both of your links - just trying to explore why the boy's speech is so poor.

[cazzz1975]

he is saying words and that is definitely a good thing, it could be simply that if he receives some speech therapy at nursery or school then it will improve things, its a shame you left the speech sessions, sometimes they seem a bit weird but they can be very useful (I have been to enough of them lol)

[sherrardk]

Hi Cazz - I left a language group which I think is different (he had previously been receiving one-to-one speech therapy which helped him a lot). At the language group their aim was to get him to sign more not to 'model' his speech by trying to improve his actual speaking. I explained the reasons to the lead speech therapist and she agreed with me that if I didn't feel the setting was appropriate for the boy then I was probably correct. She is now in the process of getting him some more one-to-one sessions (she was extremely helpful).

[cazzz1975]

that sounds good, you have to do what works for him x

[sherrardk]

I think they have got me pegged as a trouble maker as a health visitor rang me tonight to ask how thing 2 was getting on at the speech group (can't help thinking she had been tipped off that we had left) and, as an after thought, enquired about an eye appointment that thing 1 had had (and failed!).

[cazzz1975]

ignore the health visitor, I had problems with mine because she was an ignoramous. she is not a medical professional, my intervention in my childrens health was such that they all had to go on a course to learn about developmental disorders.

[sherrardk]

Good for you. She's not even our health visitor (they keep changing). I think they are keeping a little file to show how supportive they have been in case I kick up a fuss at some stage - I have already raised the whole thing about getting a statement for the boy (he can't go to school and not be able to communicate with anyone). I think I may have met her once and she called me a 'Parent carer' and I didn't strangle her! x (PS - don't think they know what is wrong with the boy in terms of speech and because they can't put him in a little box and say 'he's x, y or z' they are a bit worried that I will blame them in some way.)

[erin-x]

Sorry to butt in here but I have a question for Cazzz.. You say that health visitors aren't medical professionals.. I thought that you had to be qualified as a nurse to become a health visitor? Don't read that as a dig btw.. i'm just genuinely curious?

[sherrardk]

Hi Erin, I believe that health visitors used to be nurses or midwives in their 'former' lives. However, I'm with Cazz on this one - the only ones I have come across are patronising and irritating in the extreme. They have sing-songy voices and outside of their prescribed patter they don't offer much help. HOWEVER, I expect that there must be exceptions to this.

[cazzz1975]

the health visitors I had encountered had no idea about various learning disabilities, they knew everything about baby care, child development, age and stage changes and vaccinations. they probably are medical professionals and early child development is their speciality, maybe that is the total sum of training to be a health visitor.

maybe I had a particularly poor set of health visitors?

[cazzz1975]

I will maintain though, if you take them away from their specific pool of expertise, they become quite sketchy and vague.

[sherrardk]

I have come across many HVs and, as Cazz says, they are great on the general things but can't help with anything that's not the norm (they're thrown by twins and there are loads of them around here, you'd think they would know some of the different developmental issues for twins).

[erin-x]

Ahhright.. they're a bit know it all then lol. I've never had any experience with them but my friend is doing her midwifery training and likes the sound of doing further training to be one.

[erin-x]

^Think they know it all when they clearly don't*, by the sounds of things lol

[Psybbo]

Mickey Keenan at university of ulster

[annie0000]

sher, I think I may have mentioned before about my nephew who was also very slow to speak. He is and was undeniably very bright and understood everything said to him, he could also technically make all the required sounds for speech, it was just that the bit of his brain that translated the thoughts into words seemed to not be wired right. He had a couple of words (quite long ones) that were crystal clear, the rest were more or less just grunts. However, the young brain is a marvelous thing, and with regular speech therapy, he has massively improved and is generally very understandable. The family recently moved from Scotland to the south and his teacher did notice a slight issue, but had put that down to his accent. In early primary, they had to teach him to read in a different way from the norm here which is synthetic phonetics as that wouldn't work for him. I think they taught him the old fashioned way of word recognition. He is 9 now and as I say is doing really well and surprisingly, even when his language was at it's worst, other kids always understood him, it was only the adults that struggled. I think they key here is getting him the right support and making sure that is followed through. I'll try to find out whether his condition actually has a name and then you can google to see if it sounds right.