Tiffany Neal presenting Visual Schedules: A spectacular yet simple tool that is steeped in research and spans all ages—Let’s make them work for you!
Behavior Conference Brochure
Visual Schedules_DSI Conference
Disability and autism: Changing perceptions to foster community responsibility
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is noted to be the fastest growing developmental disability, consistently affecting more than 2% of our population. Individuals with ASD are at increased risk to experience co-occurring physical, behavioral and mental health conditions across the lifespan. Given the increased likelihood for complications and/or regression, individuals affected by ASD and their families are likely to require some form of support across the lifespan. Care providers spanning medical, community, and educational settings are charged with facilitating and implementing evidence-based practices (EBPs) across settings; however, they are often not sufficiently trained to do so. Individuals with ASD and/or developmental disabilities who are manifesting significant behavioral health challenges within the community show optimal benefit from safe and effective short-term assessment and intervention with focus on stabilization that leads to coordinated community-based support towards team facilitation, coordination and consistency in implementation of community-informed treatment plans to most respectfully respond and adapt to all patients in seeking to transform patient lives and ensure provider success.
As the prevalence of ASD continues to rise, estimates indicate that the sum of healthcare costs for the population of individuals with ASD now cost a staggering $126 billion per year in the United States, with lifetime costs of caring for one person with ASD/DD throughout his or her lifetime to be equivalent of $2.3 million dollars (Ciday, Marcus, & Mandell, 2012). Specialized services including long-term residential placements and repeated admissions to acute inpatient hospitals for individuals with severe behavioral, medical, and psychiatric needs accounted for the largest proportion of ASD/DD costs per annum.
Contributing to these costs, less than 20% of treating providers and teams report having any specific disabilities training with more than half feeling “inadequately prepared” to provide treatment (Ryan & Scior, 2016). These figures and their impact illustrate the tangible importance of this topic to providers.
Adaptation of current evidence-informed approaches within a culturally responsive framework requires a community engaged approach to effectively explore and address noted challenges and barriers. Given the public health and service needs for families and individuals with ASD, barriers and challenges in accessing adequate services are often compounded due to inequities resulting from race, ethnicity, and language minority status, across diagnostic, treatment, and quality of care variables for families and young people with ASD from cultural minorities. Given the propensity towards improved long-term outcomes and reduced health and economic costs when there is sufficient efficacy in assessment and intervention quality and intensity, the need for field-based, community-informed, implementation studies of cohorts specific to this group (i.e., cultural minority families and individuals with ASD) is of paramount importance. While the field of ASD has grown in a number of ways specific to evidence-based practices in screening, diagnosis and intervention, access to and navigation of these elements remains limited to individuals and families from more diverse, non-White backgrounds. Furthermore, community-engaged coalitions and networks are often comprised of primarily members of the cultural majority with limited ability to adequately consider and reflect the diverse needs of the full community.
WSWD Conference_Disability, Autism & Community health care
Disability and autism: Changing perceptions to foster community responsibility
Behavioral and mental health needs are increasing rapidly within the school setting, and many students are only obtaining these services within the school setting. The shortage of credentialed school psychologists impacts the breadth of services to students, families, and schools. Additionally, a limited role for school psychologists leads to burnout. Attendees will engage in a strategy session discussing the ability to maximize collaborative partnership and leverage local resources to address staffing shortages and increase services to students. Collaborative partnerships may include district administrators, school boards, higher education institutions, and state associations.
A greater knowledge of potential collaborative opportunities available to “grow your own” school psychologist. Additionally, attendees will have an opportunity to hear from other districts as to what has been impactful and successful for them. Furthermore, discussions about providing school psychological services in the face of personnel shortages, both widening the scope of practice for school psychologists and also how to address these services when there is a staffing shortage.
Bridging the Autism Service Chasm: Implementation of a Coordinated Care Continuum for Students with the Most Significant Behavioral Health Challenges
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is noted to be the fastest growing developmental disability in the United States, consistently affecting 1-2% of our population. Individuals with ASD are at increased risk to experience co-occurring physical, behavioral and mental health conditions across the lifespan. Given the increased likelihood for complications and/or regression, individuals affected by ASD and their families are likely to require some form of support across the lifespan. Care providers spanning medical, community, and educational settings are charged with facilitating and implementing evidence-based practices (EBPs) across settings; however, they are often not sufficiently trained or with adequate resources to do so. The HANDS in Autism® Coordinated Care Continuum as part of the Adolescent Autism Unit at the Indiana Neurodiagnostic Institute and Advanced Treatment Center serves to respond to the growing State need – children with ASD and/or developmental disabilities who are manifesting significant behavioral health challenges within the community and would benefit from safe and effective short-term assessment and intervention that leads to stabilization but must be followed by coordinated community-based support towards team facilitation, coordination and consistency in implementation of community-informed treatment plans to most respectfully respond and adapt to all patients in seeking to transform patient lives and ensure provider success. Within the interactive presentation, the presentation outcomes will serve to guide areas of discussion, application and consensus building in the educational needs, readiness and dialogues occurring statewide specific to this population in an effort to enhance such areas and inform further steps.
Approximately seventeen percent of Indiana’s population suffers from a developmental disability (DD) that requires professional intervention and support for the individual, family and community (Zablotsky et al, 2019). When considered together, over three million individuals living in Indiana are impacted directly and/or indirectly by DD and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) combined (United States Census Bureau, 2021) with numbers rising annually.
As the prevalence of ASD continues to rise, estimates indicate that the sum of healthcare costs for the population of individuals with ASD now cost a staggering $126 billion per year in the United States, with lifetime costs of caring for one person with ASD/DD throughout his or her lifetime to be equivalent of $2.3 million dollars (Ciday, Marcus, & Mandell, 2012). Specialized services including long-term residential placements and repeated admissions to acute inpatient hospitals for individuals with severe behavioral, medical, and psychiatric needs accounted for the largest proportion of ASD/DD costs per annum.
Contributing to these costs, less than 20% of teams report having any specific disabilities training with more than half feeling “inadequately prepared” to provide treatment (Ryan & Scior, 2016). These figures, a need to prioritize finite resources and sometimes limited staffing, and their impact on both staff and student outcomes illustrate the tangible importance of this topic to teams across all systems.
ICASE School Psychology Shortages
Spring 2023 ICASE_HANDS
Programming though HANDS in Autism was designed to respond to the growing need in the state of Indiana using an evidence-based, comprehensive model with capacity for implementation across settings and use as a teaching hub.
NDI_Infographic
NDI_Informational booklet
