Our Current Treatment Plan

I are trying a variety of approaches with Sam. Autism treatment has become a real money maker and so I try to approach each option with healthy skepticism.

Sam attends an ABA based pre-school for autistic children. Every child has a well-trained aide and the aides rotate evey 2 weeks. It is a public school program and I know we are lucky to have such a program in our area. During the school year he attends from 9 - 2:45. In July he attends the ESY program at his school from 9-1. It is a little too "campish" for me but the staff are all his regular teachers/aides and he enjoys it. Last year Sam had nothing in August and it was terrible. This year I fought for August services and we have 20 hours of ABA at home and 16 hours of parent training. It works out that Sam has 2 hours of contact with a therapist almost every day this month and it is working otu really well.

I also take Sam for private speech therapy once a week with a woman who does PROMPT. SHe is wonderful and get great things out of him.

We are also tyring biomedical therapies. Dietary interventions proved useless for Sam. He never really had digestive issues so it didn't surprise me that his gut didsn't seem to be a major factor in his autistic behaviors. My personal opinion is that gf/cf and other diet programs are worth a try for anyone with digestive problems but those gut issues are not just an autism thing.

Our biomedical plan also includes various vitamins and supplements. Sam takes a vitamin/mineral supplement made by Kirkman Labs. I didn't like their super nu thera vitamins but their kids multivitamin/mineral capsules have been good. Sam also takes the following in addition to that:
-extra vitamin D (his bloodwork showed he was deficient)
-probiotics
-prebiotics
-digestive enzymes (not sure this is doing anything but it doesn't hurt)
-DHA/fish oil

I saw the greatest improvement when I added the vitamin D and then again when we added the EPO.

Later this week, Sam will get his first B12 shot. Cross your fingers!

All of these supplements were recommended by a qualified doctor.
-Evening Primrose Oil