Free screening for autism in toddlers

A program to diagnose autism in toddlers, developed at Flinders University and used widely by clinicians, is moving to online delivery to help more people intervene early in their children’s development.

To help the program’s outreach, particularly to families in rural and remote areas, the researchers are calling for help from South Australian families with toddlers between 12 and 36 months. The program is open to any families with or without signs of autism.

The Autism Detection in Early Childhood (ADEC) program, created by Professor of Psychology Robyn Young and Flinders University researchers, is a brief, play-based tool for the assessment of autism in children (12-36 months) which has proven to be reliable and valid in early detection of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) for almost 15 years.

“We have found it creates early awareness of how ASD presents in babies, reduces the lag time between parental concern and formal diagnosis which gives children access to intervention earlier when they are most responsive to intervention,” Professor Young says.

“The ADEC has demonstrated good psychometric properties and is highly sensitive and specific to ASD. It has led to another therapeutic program covered in our early intervention  manual (SPECTRA) to assist clinicians with ongoing development.”

Now the ADEC, originally designed to be led by an expert in a clinic, needs new participants to develop an online virtual version of the program, so the play-based tasks can be conducted by parents in a child’s own home while supervised and observed by a clinician through a live video conference.

The new virtual tool, known as ADEC-V, will increase accessibility of early diagnostic assessments to young children – particularly in rural and remote areas and those limited by ongoing COVID-19 travel restrictions.

Participants are required to contact the Flinders Psychology researchers via email to help with the research. People selected will be invited to take part in one face-to-face meeting for an initial assessment.

Marcus, a young Adelaide boy diagnosed with Level 3 ASD in late 2016 at the age of two years, has received ongoing support after the early assessment

His grandmother and guardian now says the Flinders University-developed program has “turned the key and today he is such a changed child”.

“He is happy and had straight As at school last year – but most importantly is socially connected and happy,” she says.

“With the program, which he can now use himself, we have seen the ‘real’ Marcus grow up.

‘He is ‘left of centre’ and will always have ASD but life is so much easier for him now.”

The ADEC and ADEC-V are based on normative data from Australian children.

Potential participants can contact the Flinders University Autism Research group at email: asdresearch@flinders.edu.au

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