I am not going to lie……it was pretty darn exciting yesterday to be joining the current and former Presidents of the Australian Medical Association to launch their Autism Position Statement. Why is it such a big deal? Well for Professor Brian Owler and I - it is very personal. We are parents of children on the autism spectrum. We know all too well what it feels like to have our concerns minimised by well-meaning health care professionals who don’t always pick up the early signs and often don’t refer on. We know what it feels like to be worried, totally lost and needing answers.
For a long time, we have known the importance of early intervention. What is letting us down is the delays in early detection, assessment and diagnosis which means we lose the ‘early’ from early intervention.
This is a widespread problem across Australia. How do we start to address this? We have to start with the GP’s. A parent’s first point of contact when they are concerned about their child is commonly their GP.
We KNOW autism is often detectable at 12 months and diagnosable at 18 months. We KNOW early intervention can make a HUGE difference in a child’s outcome.
The only thing stopping our children from getting their best shot at a positive outcome, is the health care professional who misses it, doesn’t refer early enough and as a result loses our kids precious time.
So today’s statement (and I encourage you to read it in full) and our continued collaboration with the AMA is the beginning of the work we need to do, to ensure our children get the help they need as soon as possible.
But for Brian and I today, we were just a couple of autism parents, delighted to have the AMA on our team.
Nic
Read full media release here: http://www.autismawareness.com.au/news-events/australian-medical-association-announce-position-statement-autism-spectrum-disorder/
