EBD Blog

Arne Duncan, US Secretary of Education, wrote to the chief officers of education for each of the states in the US on 31 July 2009 regarding the use of seclusion and restraint in schools. He expressed concern about the testimony heard recently by the Education and Labor Committee of the US House of Representatives, and recommended that states adopt Positive Behavioral Interventions and Support.

My home State of Illinois has what I believe to be one good approach, including both a strong focus upon Positive Behavior Intervention and Supports (PBIS) as well as State regulations that limit the use of seclusion and restraint under most circumstances….

Several other States have also adopted effective seclusion and/or restraint policies, but there are many jurisdictions that have not, leaving students and teachers vulnerable.
Continue reading ‘A. Duncan promotes PBIS’

Over on Science-Based Medicine, John Snyder has an extended post that systematically analyzes the assertions of Robert Sears about vaccinating children. The title is “Cashing In On Fear: The Danger of Dr. Sears.” Highly recommended.

The recent posts about news coverage of mental illness (e.g., “Danny Watt’s Story” and “Jani Illustrates Troubles“) has had me thinking about how popular media portray these problems. Over on Psych Central, Margarita Tartakovsky has an article entitled “Media’s Damaging Depictions of Mental Illness” that I recommend to readers of EBD Blog. In addition to discussing myths that are too commonly perpetuated by media such as television and film, she recommends ways to help distinguish between accurate and inaccurate portrayals of mental illness.

Link to Ms. Tartakovsky’s article.

On behalf of the families of two children with Autism, a consumer advocacy groups claims that regulators in California (US) are allowing insurers to deny access to needed therapy. Consumer Watchdog seeks to require the Department of Managed Health Care to mandate that insurers pay for treatment based on applied behavior analysis for children with Autism.

KABC LA coverage

On the heels of the recent agreement in Michigan (US), I have to wonder whether advocates for children with Autism are seeing the beginning of a wave of changes in insurance support for early and intensive behavioral treatment of Autism.

Consumer Watchdog, which was previously known as “Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights,” has a pretty broad agenda. In addition to insurance issues, it addresses patients’ rights, political corruption, corporate excesses, and other topics. Consumer Watchdog’s site has links to multiple items regarding Autism.

Also see coverage by Lisa Girion of the Los Angeles Times: “Autism patients’ treatment is denied illegally, group says“; Ms. Girion covered this topic previously (see 10 Mar 2009). For other earlier posts on EBD Blog about insurance coverage for children with Autism, see 25 Jun 2009 and 20 Sep 2008.

In the US state of Michigan, a major health insurance provider will now reimburse families for the cost of providing therapy for children with autism. The case, Johns v. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, arose because Blue-Cross-Blue-Shield denied payment for behavioral treatment often called “ABA” to the family of a child with Autism. The case was settled in favor of the family last week.

Represented by Gerard Mantese, Mr. Christopher Johns alleged that the insurer should pay for the therapy for his son under the provisions of the policy. The insurance company refused and Mr. Johns sued. During depositions, Mr. Mantese and others on the Mr. Johns’ legal team learned of a draft memorandum identifying the behavioral therapy as effective and that a representative of the insurer would probably elect the behavioral therapy if that representative had a child with Autism.

Because Mr. Johns’ complaint was part of a class action suit, many other families will also benefit from the settlement. In an independent analysis of the case, Tresa Baldas discussed the implications.

The $1 million class action settlement from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan comes amid a legislative wave in which a growing number of a states are passing laws that require insurance companies to pay for autism treatments and screenings. To date, 13 states have such laws, the most recent being Connecticut, Colorado and Nevada. New Jersey is currently considering an autism bill, and Pennsylvania’s law goes into effect July 1.

The June 17 Michigan settlement, meanwhile, has autism advocates hopeful that insurance companies will stop claiming that behavioral therapy for autistic children is experimental, and start paying for it.

“It is a significant victory for the families, obviously, and it marks a trend, hopefully, that insurance companies will start to look at autism treatment differently,” said Areva Martin, an attorney at Los Angeles-based Martin & Martin who is currently handling about 30 autism cases. She believes the labeling of autism treatments as experimental is “absurd.”

I wonder what this will mean for the California rules that do not expressly exclude behavioral therapies, but set requirements for deciding whether they are reimbursable (see my earlier post on that story).

Link for a quasi-news article about the settlement. Read another of the law firm’s press releases. Here’s link to Ms. Baldas’ analysis of the case.

The Council for Children with Behavior Disorders (CCBD), an international group concerned about children and youths with EBD, published statements about the use of seclusion and restraint with students. Although the documents appear to be in preliminary form, they began circulating on the Internet today, so I’m posting copies of the PDFs here. Watch for an update of them.

• CCBD’s Position Summary on Physical Restraint & Seclusion Procedures in School Settings
• CCBD’S Position Summary on the Use of Physical Restraint Procedures in School Settings
• CCBD’S Position Summary on the The Use of Seclusion in School Settings

Link to the CCBD Web site.

Over on Behavior Mod Info readers can find several entries about the hearings regarding US schools’ use of seclusion and restraint. The hearings were conducted by the US House of Representatives’ Committee on Education and Labor.

(Apologies for the cross-posting to those who read Teach Effectively.)

The recently published study by Rossignol and colleagues about hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) for Autism has generated lots of commentary and is sure to lead to more. Because it is a treatment study and employs more careful methods than are common in many of the therapies promoted these days, I sat up and said, “Hmm. I ought to read this one.”

So I did. And I found it to be, indeed, a cut above much of the ersatz research that’s passed off as evidence in the Autism arena. But, I found some concerns, too.

Those concerns led me to poke about a bit on the Internet to see whether there were any others who were raising questions. There are. And I still have some more poking to do. But, I thought I ought to record my concerns. Thus this post.

Continue reading ‘Does Rossignol et al. show HBOT’s effective?’

The US magazine Parade, which (along with comics and advertisements) is included in the inserts of many Sunday editions of newspapers, featured a pair of pieces about Autism 27 January. In one of them, Ranit Mishori gives a brief overview of Autism and in the other Suzanne Wright provides a first-person perspective on the effects of Autism on families.

Dr. Mishori, who doubles by practicing family-practice medicine and writing about medical topics for the popular press, addresses these questions:

• Is Autism an Epidemic?
• What Is the Best Treatment?
• Do Vaccines Cause Autism?
• Is There Hope?
• Does It Work?

Continue reading ‘Autism in Parade’