Category Archives: News

Entrepreneurship the Answer for Some With Autism

When Matt Cottle asked his boss to let him work in the supermarket’s bakery, she told him he’d never do anything more than collect grocery carts.

After six years of bagging groceries and pushing carts, Cottle wanted more. He had already learned how to do some baking.

Cottle is autistic. And today he’s an entrepreneur, the owner of Stuttering King Bakery, turning out batches of cookies, brownies and scones for cafes and businesses and groups that need catering.

“I was like, OK, I am destined to do something greater than that,” Cottle says in the kitchen of his family’s Scottsdale, Arizona, home, where he spends hours each day filling orders. He generates $1,200 monthly. He named the business for Britain’s King George VI, whose struggles to speak were the subject of the film “The King’s Speech.”

Cottle is one of a few known small business owners with autism, a brain disorder that affects a person’s ability to comprehend, communicate and interact socially. There are varying degrees of autism, but even autistic people with the greatest capabilities can find it impossible to get a job because they take longer to read or process information, or because they struggle to hold conversations. One in 68 people have some form of autism, according to government figures.

There is a growing movement to help autistic adults find jobs, but for Cottle and his family, the answer was a business of his own.

Cottle had taken training to do search and rescue operations. And he tried working in a bakery. Both times, he encountered people who didn’t understand him, and who ended up yelling at and insulting him, his mother, Peg Cottle, says. He wanted to enroll in a culinary school, but an administrator gently told him and his parents it wouldn’t work out. Four years ago, the Southwest Autism Research and Research Center, or SAARC, connected Cottle with a pastry chef who mentored him. In August 2012, he unexpectedly got an order from a cafe operated by Phoenix-based SAARC. At that point, Cottle told his parents he was starting his own baking business.

“I’m happy as an angel,” he says.

CHANGING ATTITUDES

Many autistic people can run businesses if they’re given the chance to discover something they like and develop skills around their interests, says Temple Grandin, one of the best-known advocates for people with autism.

“If you get them exposed to something, they can get a career,” says Grandin, author of “The Autistic Brain.”

Grandin, who has autism, didn’t speak until she was four years old. In her teens, she was bullied by classmates who made fun of the way she spoke — she repeated the same phrases over and over.

“They called me ‘tape recorder.'” she says.

In her teens, Grandin was exposed to horses at a boarding school and cattle on her aunt’s ranch, and she began working with farm animals. She eventually created a business designing equipment for handling livestock.

People with the most severe autism aren’t able to work because their disabilities limit their ability to learn. But it’s only in the last two decades that society has come to realize that many people with disabilities including autism can work, says Paul Pizzutello, principal of Reach Academy, a West Harrison, New York, school whose students include some who are autistic.

“With many people with autism, it’s not their intellect that a problem, it’s their ability to engage with their environment and manage social contacts,” he says.

INSPIRED BY A KING

Patients with autism spectrum disorder are not sensitive to ‘being imitated’

A Japanese research group led by Prof Norihiro Sadato, a professor of the National Institute for Physiological Sciences (NIPS), National Institutes of Natural Sciences (NINS), has found that people with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have decreased activity in an area in the brain critical for understanding if his/her movement was imitated by others. These results will be published in Neuroscience Research, now available online.

The research group of Norihiro Sadato, a professor of NIPS, Hirotaka Kosaka, a specially-assigned associate professor of the University of Fukui, and Toshio Munesue, a professor of Kanazawa University measured brain activity by functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) when one’s movement was imitated by others. The group studied brain activity when a subject saw his/her finger movement imitated or not imitated by others. Normal subjects have increased activity in the extrastriate body area (EBA) when they are imitated compared to when they are not being imitated. The EBA is a region in the visual cortex for visual processing that responds powerfully during the perception of human body parts. On the other hand, because this kind of activity in the EBA of subjects with ASD was not observed, it shows that the EBA of subjects with ASD is not working properly when imitated.

Persons with ASD are known to have difficulty in interpersonal communication and have trouble noticing that their movement was imitated. Behavioral intervention research to alleviate ASD is proceeding and indicates that training utilizing imitation is useful. The result of the above research not only provided clues to ASD, but also can be used in the evaluation of behavioral intervention to alleviate the disorder.

Early Warning Sign of Autism in Infants (“joint attention” and smiling):

Some babies are at risk for autism because they have an older sibling that has the disorder. To find new ways to detect Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) earlier in life, researchers are exploring the subtleties of babies’ interactions with others and how they relate to the possibility and severity of future symptoms.

A new study helps us to understand the connection between early joint attention before one year and later ASD symptoms. Joint attention is an early form of communication that develops toward the end of the first year. It’s the act of making eye contact with another person to share an experience.

Previous studies have shown that low levels of initiating joint attention are linked to later autism symptoms in high-risk siblings. The current study reveals that joint attention without a positive affective component (a smile) in the first year is particularly important to this relationship.

“The ability to coordinate attention with another person without a smile, without an emotional component, seems to be particularly important for high-risk siblings in the development of ASD symptoms,” says Devon Gangi, Ph.D. student in the UM College of Arts and Sciences and first author of the study. “The detection of markers associated with autism early in life, before a child can be diagnosed with autism, is important to help identify children at the greatest need for early interventions.”

The findings show that early joint attention initiation without smiling – matter-of-fact looking at an examiner to communicate interest in a toy – was negatively associated with ASD symptoms. According to the study, the less joint attention without smiling at 8 months in a high-risk sibling, the more likely they were to have elevated ASD symptoms by 30 months. Impairments in joint attention are a core deficit in ASD. Now we know that less early initiating joint attention without smiling is a particularly important skill for high-risk siblings.

Not all smiles are the same. Children who were at risk for autism (both those who did and did not later develop symptoms of autism) had lower levels of anticipatory smiles than children who were not at risk for ASD. That is, when an infant first looks at an object, smiles, and then turns that smile towards a social partner, as if the smile anticipates the gaze. On the other hand, a reactive smile occurs when an infant first gazes at a partner, then smiles. Children at risk for ASD did not show differences from low-risk siblings in reactive smiling.

“High-risk siblings seem to have particular difficulty in sharing their preexisting positive affect with another person, which is what happens during an anticipatory smile,” says Daniel Messinger, professor of psychology in the UM College of Arts and Sciences and principal investigator of the study. “This difficulty may be indicative of a broader deficit autism trait among most high-risk siblings.”

The study is titled “Joint attention initiation with and without positive affect: Risk group differences and associations with ASD symptoms.” It was recently published in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. Lisa V. Ibañez, who received her Ph.D. working with Dr. Messinger at UM, is co-author of the study.

The researchers primarily predicted the children’s symptom level. Symptoms vary in at-risk siblings, some of whom have an ASD outcome and some of whom do not. They did not look at whether the younger sibling eventually received an ASD diagnosis. In the future, the researchers would like to examine whether these early behaviors also predict who will have autism.

Research has consistently shown that green-space helps to increase kid’s attention to task, reduce stress-levels, and promote productivity.

Playing in schoolyards that feature natural habitats and trees and not just asphalt and recreation equipment reduces children’s stress and inattention, according to a University of Colorado Boulder study.

Working on class assignments or gardening in such settings also provide stress-reducing benefits for youth, according to a paper published in the journal Health & Place. The study is one of the first of its kind to focus on the relationship between student access to green settings and stress.

“Many schools already offer stress management programs, but they’re about teaching individuals how to deal with stress instead of creating stress-reducing environments,” said Louise Chawla, CU-Boulder professor of environmental design and lead author of the study. “Schools are where children spend a major part of their life hours, so it’s an important place to look at for integrating daily contact with the natural world because of the many benefits it brings.”

Natural-terrain schoolyards – with dirt, scrub oak and water features, for example – foster supportive relationships and feelings of competence, the researchers found.

Combination schoolyards that have at least some natural-habitat landscaping, even if they include built structures as well, can have positive impacts on children, said Chawla, who also is the director of CU-Boulder’s Children, Youth and Environments Center.

Co-authors of the paper included three former doctoral students: Kelly Keena and Illène Pevec, both who were at the University of Colorado Denver; and Emily Stanley, who was at Antioch University New England in Keene, N.H.

For the study, a variety of settings were observed including elementary-school students’ recess in wooded and built areas; fourth- through sixth-grade students’ use of a natural habitat for science and writing lessons; and high school students’ gardening for volunteerism, required school service or coursework.

The sites were located at a private elementary school in Baltimore that serves children with dyslexia and other learning disabilities; a public elementary school in suburban Denver with students from a range of socioeconomic backgrounds; and four public and private entities for teenagers – a college preparatory school, a public high school, an alternative school and an afterschool program – throughout Colorado.

Together the researchers logged more than 1,200 hours of observation. They interviewed students, teachers, parents and alumni and coded keywords from the interviews for their findings, among other methods.

Over three school years at the Baltimore elementary school recess site, 96 percent of students in the first through fourth grades chose to play in the woods when they had the option of heading either there, to a playground or to an athletic field. In the woods, the younger children freely engaged in exploratory and sensory-based activities. The older children cooperatively organized activities like building forts and trading found objects.

Teachers at the Baltimore elementary school reported that the students returned from recess with longer attention spans. Some parents said the experience was empowering and critical to their child’s well-being and social and emotional balance.

Students at the Denver elementary school, who completed assignments in a natural habitat, found the process to be an escape from stress in the classroom and at home, according to the study. Twenty-five percent of the students spontaneously described the green area as “peaceful” or “calm.”

There also were anecdotal observations at the Denver school. In one case for example, a group of menacing schoolmates were unable to provoke a student in the green space whose temper normally was quick to escalate, according to the author.

“In more than 700 hours of observations at the Denver school’s green outdoor space, zero uncivil behaviors were observed,” said Chawla. “But there were many incidences of arguments and rudeness indoors, as there are at many schools.”

Among the teenage participants throughout Colorado who gardened, 46 percent referred to calm, peace and relaxation in addition to other positive descriptors when reflecting on their experiences. They also gave four main reasons for their favorable reactions: being outdoors in fresh air; feeling connected to a natural living system; successfully caring for living things; and having time for quiet self-reflection.

For schools that are interested in providing natural habitats for students but only have built outdoor spaces, Chawla suggests tearing out some areas of asphalt or creating joint-use agreements with city parks and open space.

“Schools are really prime sites for an ecological model of health and for building access to nature into part of the school routine as a health measure,” said Chawla.

Antibiotic Augmentin Linked to Autism?

In a study released this week, the antibiotic Augmentin TM has been implicated in the formation of autism. The study published in Medical Hypotheses strongly suggests the possibility of ammonia poisoning as a result of young children taking Augmentin.

Yonkers, NY (PRWEB) January 5, 2005

In a study released this week, the antibiotic Augmentin TM has been implicated in the formation of autism. The study strongly suggests the possibility of ammonia poisoning as a result of young children taking Augmentin. Augmentin has been given to children since the late 1980’s for bacterial infections. Composed of amoxicillin and clavulanate potassium, Augmentin has proven a potent antibacterial, especially for ear infections which quickly become resistant to amoxicillin alone.

The manufacture of AugmentinTM involves the fermentation of clavulanic acid. The fermentation process involves large amounts of urea/ammonia. Ingested ammonia can potentially injure the intestines of small children as well as brain and nervous tissue. Even a small residue of urea/ammonia can potentially induce a substantial brain inflammation or abnormality.

The study, published in Medical Hypotheses, (2005 64, 312–315) examines 206 children under the age of 3 diagnosed with autism. These children were found to have a significantly higher number of ear infections than the general pediatric population. These same children received, on average, 12 courses of antibiotics representing a sum total number of 2480. Of the 2480, 893 of these courses were Augmentin with 362 of those given under the age of 1 year.

Dr. Joan Fallon, scientist, autism researcher and author of the study, states that, “Augmentin is one of the most widely prescribed drugs for children. Its introduction into the marketplace for use in the treatment of childhood illnesses corresponds with the significant increase in the incidence of autism. It is possible that some children, especially those with immaturity, or others at risk for developmental disorders can be injured by taking this drug. It is imperative that further research be undertaken to determine if a subset of children are at risk for neurotoxicity due to the use of clavulanate or clavulanic acid in pharmaceutical preparations – especially Augmentin.”

Is Autism Risk Mostly Genetic? Read the Latest Here:

Researchers claim that nearly 60% of autism risk is genetic, with the implicated variant genes being common among the general population. They publish the results of their research in the journal Nature Genetics.

Autism risk is ‘mostly genetic,’ according to statistical analysis

Monday 21 July 2014 – 8am PST

MNT FeaturedAcademic Journal

Public / Patient:
1 2 3 4 5
3 ratings
Health Professionals:
1 2 3 4 5
1 rating
Researchers claim that nearly 60% of autism risk is genetic, with the implicated variant genes being common among the general population. They publish the results of their research in the journal Nature Genetics.

Autism is widely believed to be caused by an interplay of genetics and other factors. However, scientists have not reached a consensus on how much of an influence genes have on autism risk.

DNA magnifying glass
“We show very clearly that inherited common variants comprise the bulk of the risk that sets up susceptibility to autism,” say the researchers.

Recent evidence has suggested that the genomes of people who have autism are more likely to include de novo mutations – rare and spontaneous mutations with significant effects that are thought to account for particular cases of autism.

“Many people have been focusing on de novo mutations, such as the ones that can occur in the sperm of an older father,” explains Joseph D. Buxbaum, PhD, the study’s lead investigator and director of the Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment and professor of psychiatry, neuroscience and genetics and genomic sciences at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.

“While we find these mutations are also key contributors, it is important to know that there is underlying risk in the family genetic architecture itself.”

By conducting a “rigorous analysis” of DNA sequence variations as part of the Population-Based Autism Genetics and Environment Study (PAGES) Consortium, Dr. Buxbaum’s team found that about 52.4% of autism cases can be traced back to both common and rare inherited variations. By contrast, spontaneous mutations were found to account for just 2.6% of total autism risk.

“We show very clearly that inherited common variants comprise the bulk of the risk that sets up susceptibility to autism,” Dr. Buxbaum says. “But while families can be genetically loaded for autism risk, it may take additional rare genetic factors to actually produce the disorder in a particular family member.”

The study used data from Sweden’s universal health registry to compare about 3,000 participants, including autistic subjects and a control group. The researchers say that PAGES is the largest study of its kind to date.

New statistical methods promise ‘more reliable results’

Limitations in sample size have previously made it difficult to ascertain the relative influence of common, rare inherited and rare spontaneous variations. Differences in the statistical models and methods used across studies have also presented challenges in obtaining a consensus view, with estimates of autism heritability varying from 17-50%.

In PAGES, new statistical methods – such as “machine learning techniques and dimension reduction tools” – were deployed, which the researchers claim allowed a more reliable method for assessing heritability.

The researchers were also able to access data from a parallel study of Swedish families that looked at twins, cousins, age of the father at birth and the psychiatric history of the parents.

Thomas Lehner, chief of the National Institute of Mental Health’s Genomics Research Branch, says:

“This is a different kind of analysis than employed in previous studies. Data from genome-wide association studies was used to identify a genetic model instead of focusing just on pinpointing genetic risk factors. The researchers were able to pick from all of the cases of illness within a population-based registry.”

Last month, Medical News Today reported on a study that suggested exposure to pesticides during pregnancy increases risk of the child developing autism.

Written by

Autism, Vaccinations, and Aborted Fetal Cells: The Debate Continues

Just when the pharmaceutical industry thought the vaccine-autism controversy had been resolved, the National Vaccine Advisory Committee has recommended further study of vaccine safety. A perceived fear of the safety of the U.S. vaccination schedule has led increasing numbers of parents to opt out of full compliance. The numbers of children who are not fully vaccinated has now reached a point where “herd” immunity may be compromised, compelling the Centers for Disease Control to hold town-hall meetings and convene a Vaccine Safety Working Subgroup. Despite research ruling out mercury (Thimerosal) or the measles portion of one specific vaccine, autism continues to rise to a level of one in every 64 children in the UK.

The NVAC draft report recommends further study of the potential for vaccines to contribute to autism in children who have underlying mitochondrial disease, a worthwhile study given the clinical history of such children developing autism after vaccinations (see Poling case). What the NVAC has overlooked, however, in their recommendations, is that epidemic regressive autism is associated with the switch from using animal cells to produce vaccines to the use of aborted human fetal cells for vaccine production. Now when we vaccinate our children, some vaccines also deliver contaminating aborted human fetal DNA. The safety of this has never been tested.

Autism and autism spectrum disorder are polygenic diseases, meaning that multiple genes have been shown to be associated with these diseases. Studies have also clearly shown that there is an environmental component, a trigger, that is required. Vaccines are an obvious potential environmental trigger for autism because of the almost universal childhood exposure to vaccines in first world countries. The vaccine-autism connection was first hypothesized following the introduction of a new measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine to the U.S. in 1979, with complete U.S. market share by 1983, and to the UK in 1988. Autism rates began to rise in the U.S. after 1979 and rose dramatically after 1983, and likewise rose in the UK after 1988, leading physicians to suspect a link. Initially, the measles component of this vaccine, MMR II, was suspected to be the culprit. Subsequent studies have also focused on the presence of mercury in vaccines, which incidentally, the MMR II vaccine did not contain.

Those studies have largely ruled out the new measles portion of the MMR II or mercury as the environmental trigger for autism. However, the compelling temporal association between this new MMR vaccine and autism cannot be ignored or explained away. What has been ignored is the fact that this new MMR vaccine introduced the use of aborted fetal cells for vaccine production. At one point, as much as 94 percent of children in the U.S. and 98 percent of children in the UK were given this vaccine.

Today, more than 23 vaccines are contaminated by the use of aborted fetal cells. There is no law that requires that consumers be informed that some vaccines are made using aborted fetal cells and contain residual aborted fetal DNA. While newer vaccines produced using aborted fetal cells do inform consumers, in their package inserts, that the vaccines contain contaminating DNA from the cell used to produce the vaccine, they do not identify the cells as being derived from electively aborted human fetuses. (See the Varivax—chicken pox—package insert for the presence of MRC5 residual DNA.)

In other words, they tell you what is in the vaccine, but they don’t fully inform you where it came from. The earliest aborted fetal cell-produced vaccines such as Meruvax (rubella) and MMR II do not even inform consumers that the vaccines contain contaminating DNA from the cell used to produce them. Furthermore, it is unconscionable that the public-health risk of injecting our children with residual contaminating human aborted fetal DNA has been ignored.

How could the contaminating aborted fetal DNA create problems? It creates the potential for autoimmune responses and/or inappropriate insertion into our own genomes through a process called recombination. There are groups researching the potential link between this DNA and autoimmune diseases such as juvenile (type I) diabetes, multiple sclerosis and lupus. Our organization, Sound Choice Pharmaceutical Institute, is focused on studying the quantity, characteristics and genomic recombination of the aborted fetal DNA found in many of our vaccines.

Preliminary bioinformatics research conducted at SCPI indicates that “hot spots” for DNA recombination are found in nine autism-associated genes present on the X chromosome. These nine genes are involved in nerve-cell synapse formation, central nervous system development and mitochondrial function.

Could genomic insertion of the aborted fetal DNA, found in some of our childhood vaccines since 1979, be an environmental trigger for autism? Could the fact that genes critical for nerve synapse formation and nervous system development are found on the X chromosome provide some explanation of why autism is predominantly a disease found in boys? Could the “hot spots” identified in these autism-associated genes be sites for insertion of contaminating aborted fetal DNA?

These questions must be answered, and quickly. Recent literature suggests that autism spectrum disorder may now impact one out of every 100 children. The pharmaceutical industry is also currently moving to replace more animal-produced vaccines with aborted-fetal-cell production and also to produce biologic drugs using aborted fetal cells.

The practice of using aborted fetal cells for vaccine and drug production creates wrenching moral dilemmas for parents and consumers, ignores informed consent rights, and exposes our children and ourselves to contaminants lacking safety evaluations. We cannot ignore this issue in good conscience, and we cannot afford to wait.
Dr. Deisher is president of Sound Choice Pharmaceutical Institute (www.soundchoice.org), as well as a cofounder and the research and development director for Ave Maria Biotechnology Company (www.avmbiotech.com), which promote pro-life biotechnology. This article is an adaptation and update of Sound Choice Pharmaceutical Institute’s June 2009 newsletter and is published with its kind permission. For more information on Dr. Deisher, see “Providing real choice: A conversation with Dr. Theresa Deisher” in American Life League’s Celebrate Life magazine (January-February 2009) .

THE AUTISM PARENTS’ GUIDE TO RECLAIMING YOUR LIFE is Released

Autism Parents Guide

New York, New York

Deanna Picon, founder of Your Autism Coach, LLC (http://yourautismcoach.com) and the mother of an 18-year-old, non-verbal son with autism, has just published an innovative and life-affirming guide written specifically for and completely about the parents of autistic children.

The Autism Parents’ Guide To Reclaiming Your Life provides parents with proven techniques and realistic strategies to help overcome the challenges of raising a child with autism, while focusing on building a rewarding life for themselves. It is designed for those parents who have just been handed the diagnosis, as well as those who have been dealing with the autism journey for years.

The book can be purchased at http://yourautismcoach.com and http://amazon.com, or by calling (347) 869-4705.

Throughout the book, Picon takes parents by the hand starting with the day they get the autism diagnosis and shows them how to adapt to this new life by building an autism “battle plan” for conquering these circumstances effectively. She confronts the five stages of a parent’s reaction, along with the potential for “nuclear side effects” – all of which combine in some form or fashion to create what she calls the “Autism Parents’ Spectrum Disorder.”

The book also addresses the impact that autism has on the whole family, as well as how to manage expectations regarding possible treatments.

In the last section of the book, Picon refers to autism as “the enemy” to the parents, an enemy that can take away their mental and physical health, their time and money, their relationships, their career, and all the joy in their lives…if they let it. Therefore, she says that parents should declare war on this enemy, and she provides detailed instructions for building a comprehensive, yet doable battle plan that deals with autism head on. What’s the ultimate objective? To empower everyone concerned and enable each member of the family to have the most fulfilling life possible.

Complementary and Alternative Medicine on the Rise for Children with Autism

The term “CAM” seems to be gaining popularity these days. And interestingly, an increasing number of parents of children with autism seem to be turning to CAM for help in the treatment of some symptoms of the disorder.

But what exactly is CAM?

Globe

The term CAM (complementary and alternative medicine) is, according to the NIH National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) website, is “often used to mean the array of health care approaches with a history of use or origins outside of mainstream medicine, [and it is] actually hard to define and may mean different things to different people.”

CAM falls into two subgroups, the website says: natural products, often sold as dietary supplements; and mind and body practices (such as yoga, meditation, movement, deep breathing, and many others).

In an interview with NAMI, Robert Hendren, D.O., Professor and Vice Chair, Director, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of California, San Francisco – whose studies have included “natural” products such as omega-3s, pro-biotics, and melatonin – said it does appear that CAM is on the rise.

“There’s an increasing acceptability,” he said. “People also want to start off trying things that they think of as milder and having fewer side effects.”

One of the CAM treatments from the mind and body category that parents are turning to is yoga for their children with autism.

A 2012 study, led by Dr. Kristie Patten Koenig, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Occupational Therapy at NYU, found that children with autism spectrum disorder who did yoga at their elementary school behaved better than kids with autism who weren’t doing yoga.

The study, which was conducted at a public elementary school in the Bronx section of New York City, had the kids follow a specific routine each morning, five days a week, for 17 minutes, for 16 weeks. The routine had the kids take their mats out, breathe deeply, assume yoga poses, tense and relax muscles, and sing. The researchers compared the kids in the program, which was called “Get Ready to Learn,” with a control group of kids doing a standard morning routine. Teachers said that the kids doing yoga exhibited significantly fewer problematic behaviors overall.

“We found that the kids in our study group showed less irritability, a decrease in a lot of the maladaptive behaviors associated with autism, and, anecdotally, the teachers reported that they were able to transition into their day much better,” Dr. Koenig told NAMI in an interview.

“Kids were really a part of setting up the room, and getting the yoga mats down. It was part of their routine,” she said. “Kids that are autistic do really well if they have that structure. We watched the tone of the class change as they started their yoga – you could just see that it produced a totally different atmosphere in the class.”

Dr. Koenig said that yoga programs are being implemented in schools across the country more and more … and that the kids who benefit do not necessarily have autism.

“[Yoga] addresses a couple of issues,” she said. “Everything from obesity to getting kids moving more to more attentive and mindfulness in school – so it’s becoming more and more popular.”

Dr. Koenig cautioned that yoga should be thought of as a complementary treatment rather than an alternative one.

“There’s a strong body of evidence for a variety of conditions that suggest that yoga and mindfulness and meditation is helpful,” Dr. Koenig said. “But more from the complementary standpoint.”

Dr. Hendren, like Dr. Koenig, also believes in the full body/mind approach.

“I think it’s important to do all of these things with behavioral treatments like ABA (Applied Behavioral Analysis) and speech and language and OT,” Dr. Hendren said, “so it doesn’t take the place of a complete treatment package. You need to have that comprehensive treatment to get the best result.”

Dr. Hendren also said that he believes the terms “complementary” and “alternative” are sometimes misunderstood and therefore, overlooked.

“There are an increasing number of studies that some of these things are of benefit,” he said. “The terms ‘complementary and alternative’ give us an image that somehow they are not ‘real’ or they are not fully a good treatment – but many are helping the body be more resilient. So I think if we have ways of making the body healthier — that’s good and not necessarily CAM.”