
________________________________________________________________
Monday,
August 31,
2009
Vol. 13 No. 92
PEOPLE
Putting Faith Into Practice For Autistic Kids
Rag Business Enriches Life Of Woman With Autism
Voice Of An Angel
Mom Of Student Voted Out Of Class "Survivor-Style" Files Lawsuit
PUBLIC HEALTH
How Independent Are Vaccine Defenders?
EDUCATION
Service Animal Or Comfort Dog?
RESEARCH
Brain Structure Invests Us With Sense Of Personal Space
TREATMENT
Removing The Barriers Of Autism
Possible Cure For Peanut Allergy Discovered: Peanuts
MEDIA
Could Vaccines Given To Young Children Cause Autism?
LETTERS
PEOPLE
Putting Faith Into Practice For Autistic Kids
By Diana Fishlock for the Harrisburg
Patriot-News.
bit.ly/1DB50K
Sometimes, when the choir sings, Aubree
Canonizado throws her head back, closes her eyes and lifts her hands to
the heavens.
At those moments, her father George
believes, she's sharing a moment with Jesus.
"Jesus didn't shun anybody. He migrated
toward people who needed him," said George Canonizado, a resident of
Mechanicsburg, a few miles west of Harrisburg across the Susquehanna
River. His daughter Aubree is autistic. "Everybody needs to know Jesus
loves them."
Jesus loves them, but the person in the
next pew might struggle. Children with autism sometimes exhibit
behaviors people don't normally see in church. They yell, flap their
hands, talk nonstop about one topic, have inappropriate contact with
strangers, throw tantrums and behave unpredictably. Some are sensitive
to light, noise, crowds and change.
With autism dramatically on the rise,
the religious community is seizing an opportunity to reach out to
families with autism, said Shelly Christensen, author of "The Jewish
Community Guide to Inclusion of People with Disabilities."
"This isn't about them and us. This is
us. This is all of us," said Christensen, program manager of the Jewish
Community Inclusion Program for People with Disabilities in Minneapolis.
Christensen tells of adults who longed
to take part in religious life for decades, but never felt welcome.
"It's their birthright," she said.
"A faith community should be the first
place people turn to. You look at the tenets of Judeo-Christian, Muslim
religions." Christensen said. "Abraham and Sarah welcomed the
strangers. He washed their feet, feeding them, serving them, not
patronizing them."
Autism can isolate a family.
Anne Platt doesn't even try to take her
son Billy, 10, to church anymore. She and her husband, Keith, attend
Good Shepherd Church in nearby Camp Hill with their other children, one
parent staying home with Billy while the other worships.
"I can't think of my son first. As
Catholics first, that's our worship and that's a very sacred thing,"
said Platt, of Mechanicsburg. "My son is not going to benefit
spiritually from being there, so I feel it's not fair to me to put that
on someone else, to detract from their experience so my son can be
physically present in the church."
Billy would spend the entire service
singing, talking, running through scripts and getting into other
people's personal space, she said. Taking him to the church cry room
just sent Billy into sensory overload, she said.
She would love to go to church as a
family, especially at the holidays, but Easter and Christmas, with
their packed pews, are especially bad times for Billy.
It's all about juggling the needs of one
group with that of another, Platt said. "There are times you can do
that, but there are times that might not be possible."
William Stillman, a writer who lives in
Hummelstown, about 10 miles east of Harrisburg, believes people with
autism have a great capacity for knowing God.
There's a myth that people with autism
are in their own little world, but monks meditate to get into their own
world, to get closer to God, said Stillman, author of several books on
autism and God.
Some people with autism do a lot of
rocking and twirling. "Sufi dervishes do the same thing to get closer
to God. The autistic person does it naturally," he said at a workshop
this spring at First United Methodist Church in neighboring Hershey.
"This is not a plague. This is not a
scourge. This is not the epidemic that the media reports it to be. It's
an opportunity," said Stillman, who has Asperger's syndrome and has
worked with autistic children for many years.
+ Read more: bit.ly/1DB50K
• • •
Rag Business Enriches Life of Woman
With Autism
By Lorilee Craker, The Grand Rapids
Press bit.ly/nnMnB
Lisa Witte is zipping through old
sweatshirts, turning them into rags, like a meat cutter slicing swiftly
through hunks of roast beef.
"She loves it," said Lisa's mom, Phyllis
Witte, of her deft daughter. "She can produce 100 pounds of rags in
three hours -- she's so fast."
It's all part of a day's work at Lisa's
Quality Rags, the remarkable -- and profitable -- business owned and
operated by the 29-year-old woman with special needs. Diagnosed at age
2 with autism, Witte can't read, write or talk beyond saying, "Hi, I'm
Lisa," and sometimes parroting what others say.
"It's amazing she can be a productive
member of society," Phyllis Witte said. She and Lisa's father, Teunis,
used to think, "'There's so much she can do, yet then again, how will
she ever find a real occupation?' God opened all the doors."
Employed since the age of 15 by Goodwill
Industries, Lisa Witte had been trained in a number of skills,
including her starting task taking clothes out of boxes and putting
them on hangers. "Her aide soon realized she could do a lot more than
hang clothes," Phyllis Witte said. "Goodwill taught her skill after
skill."
By last summer, the young woman was a
veteran rag cutter. Drawing on used knit sweatshirts and T-shirts that
Goodwill hadn't been able to sell, Lisa Witte would slice the clothing
into squares about 12-by-12 inches and produce absorbent rags ideal for
heavy-duty industrial spills and equipment cleaning.
It was the perfect match between worker
and work, as high-energy Lisa thrived on whipping out 1,000 pounds of
rags per month.
When Goodwill's government funding for
Lisa Witte's program ended, the Wittes had an idea: Why not set Lisa up
with her own rag cutting business? Goodwill was happy to help their
longtime employee. The organization sold three cutting machines to Lisa
and her parents and handed over their customer list at no cost. "They
really wanted Lisa to succeed," Phyllis Witte said.
"We knew Lisa was a great individual and
a hard worker," said Jill Wallace, vice president of community
relations for Goodwill Industries. "We provided her with (the machines)
at a discounted cost, and we were happy to help her. She's happy, and
she's got a job and is contributing to society."
Set up as a microenterprise through Hope
Network (which provides Lisa with a "skill builder" aide during her
25-hour work week), Lisa's Quality Rags was born about a year ago. Four
thrift stores -- New Life, New to You, Project Hope and Nice Twice --
throw their unusable shirts into a "Lisa's box."
New Life Thrift Store on Division Avenue
in Wyoming houses Lisa Witte's operation rent-free in its basement.
• • •
Voice of An Angel
By Jessica Lyons. bit.ly/KBk3r
Tennis stars playing at the U.S. Open
aren’t the only people getting ready to shine at the event. Gina Marie
Incandela, a 7-year-old with autism, will return for the third year in
a row to sing the National Anthem before a match.
Born in Long Island, Gina now lives in
Florida. When she was just two, and not yet speaking, her parents took
her to see a doctor to undergo some evaluations.
Mom Michelle said that autism was a
diagnosis they were not expecting. As soon as she heard it, she began
doing research and the whole family sprang into action, she said, and
began looking for services and meeting with therapists.
*
Even when Gina could only say
vowel sounds, she seemed drawn to music and would frequently hum
melodies. Michelle said that she had good pitch, could hold notes
perfectly, was in tune and would even use vibrato.
“We knew, at that point, she was
definitely going to be somehow musically inclined,” Michelle said.
By the age of four, Gina was speaking,
and had also begun music therapy. Her ability to speak and sing soon
went hand-in-hand, both improving dramatically, her mom said.
+ Read more: bit.ly/KBk3r
• • •
Mom of Student Voted Out Of Class "Survivor-Style" Files Lawsuit
By Colleen Wixon South Florida
Sun-Sentinel.com bit.ly/hGSMH
The mother of the kindergartner voted
out of his classroom more than a year ago has filed a federal lawsuit.
The complaint in Florida's Southern
District of federal court targets the St. Lucie County School Board,
teacher Wendy Portillo, the principal and vice principal at Morningside
Elementary in Port St. Lucie, Superintendent Michael Lannon, the local
head of education for special needs and St. Lucie County Classroom
Teachers Association and Classified Unit.
Melissa Barton said in the lawsuit filed
Thursday that the incident traumatized her son, Alex Barton, damaging
his self-worth and feelings toward school and people.
"It's been difficult," said Barton. Alex
is in therapy to deal with the incident at Morningside Elementary, she
said.
While the lawsuit seeks unspecified
damages, Barton and her attorneys say the lawsuit isn't about money.
"This is a case about every child who
attends school in Florida," said Barton's attorney Paul Sopp, adding
that the lawsuit focuses on the violation of Alex's civil rights.
In May 2008, Alex's teacher Wendy
Portillo asked his classmates to vote as to whether he should be
allowed back in the classroom. Alex was sent out of the classroom
earlier because of behavior issues.
As Alex stood in front of the room
alongside Portillo, students told him how his behavior made them feel.
Alex then was voted out of the class, 14 to 2.
Alex, who since has been diagnosed with
a form of autism, spent the day in the nurse's office. It was his last
day in a St. Lucie County public school classroom. Last year, Alex got
homebound services from the district. This year, he started second
grade in a private school.
Portillo originally was suspended for
one year and her tenure was revoked.
Although an administrative law judge
upheld Superintendent Michael Lannon's recommendation, the School Board
reversed itself and gave Portillo back her tenure. The one-year unpaid
suspension ends in November.
School District spokeswoman Janice Karst
said the district does not comment on pending litigation.
Barton said Alex still remembers the
vote and gets therapy to work through those issues. He talks about how
people don't like him, she said.
"It's not going to disappear. This is
something that is going to affect him the rest of his life," she said.
• • •
PUBLIC HEALTH
How Independent Are Vaccine Defenders?
bit.ly/1JozLT
Sharyl Attkisson Investigates Vaccine
Advocates Taking Funding From The Companies Whose Vaccines They Endorse
Government officials and some
scientists say there's no link between vaccines and autism ? and
they're often backed by independent experts. But how "independent" are
they? Sharyl Attkisson reports.
(CBS) For years some parents and
scientists have raised concerns about vaccine safety, including a
possible link to autism and ADD. Many independent experts have sided
with government officials and other scientists who say there's no
possible connection. But how "independent" are they? CBS News
investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson shares here's what she
found.
They're some of the most trusted
voices in the defense of vaccine safety: the American Academy of
Pediatrics, Every Child By Two, and pediatrician Dr. Paul Offit.
But CBS News has found these three have
something more in common - strong financial ties to the industry whose
products they promote and defend.
The vaccine industry gives millions to
the Academy of Pediatrics for conferences, grants, medical education
classes and even helped build their headquarters. The totals are kept
secret, but public documents reveal bits and pieces.
• A $342,000 payment from Wyeth,
maker of the pneumococcal vaccine - which makes $2 billion a year in
sales.
• A $433,000 contribution from
Merck, the same year the academy endorsed Merck's HPV vaccine - which
made $1.5 billion a year in sales.
• Another top donor: Sanofi
Aventis, maker of 17 vaccines and a new five-in-one combo shot just
added to the childhood vaccine schedule last month.
Every Child By Two, a group that
promotes early immunization for all children, admits the group takes
money from the vaccine industry, too - but wouldn't tell us how much.
A spokesman told CBS News: "There are
simply no conflicts to be unearthed." But guess who's listed as the
group's treasurers? Officials from Wyeth and a paid advisor to big
pharmaceutical clients.
Then there's Paul Offit, perhaps the
most widely-quoted defender of vaccine safety.
He's gone so far as to say babies can
tolerate "10,000 vaccines at once."
This is how Offit described himself in a
previous interview: "I'm the chief of infectious disease at Children's
Hospital of Philadelphia and a professor of pediatrics at Penn's
medical school," he said.
+ Read more: bit.ly/1JozLT
• • •
EDUCATION
Service Animal Or Comfort Dog?
Families, schools are at odds over whether service dogs should be
allowed to accompany autistic children to classes, leaving the decision
to the courts
By Lindsey Tanner for The Associated
Press. bit.ly/aqk8s
Like seeing-eye dogs for the blind,
trained dogs are now being used to help autistic children deal with
their disabilities. But some schools want to keep the animals out, and
families are fighting back.
Two autistic elementary school students
recently won court orders in Illinois allowing their dogs to accompany
them to school. Their lawsuits follow others in California and
Pennsylvania over schools’ refusal to allow dogs that parents say calm
their children, ease transitions and even keep the kids from running
into traffic.
At issue is whether the dogs are true
“service dogs” — essential to managing a disability — or simply
companions that provide comfort.
School districts say they are not
discriminating, just drawing the line to protect the safety and health
of other students who may be allergic to or scared of dogs.
“The school district has 650 students,
not just one. So we have to balance,” said Brandon Wright, attorney for
the Villa Grove district in central Illinois, which objected to
6-year-old Kaleb Drew’s plan to bring his yellow Labrador retriever,
Chewey, to school.
Kaleb’s family won a judge’s order in
July allowing the dog to come to class until a trial, set to start Nov.
10.
Service dogs have long been used by the
blind, but training them to help those with autism is relatively new.
While there’s little research on how these animals affect autistic
children, families like Kaleb’s say they have seen marked improvement.
And the support group Autism Speaks includes a list of dog-training
groups among resources on its Web site.
Autism is a developmental disorder that
involves behaviors such as poor eye contact, trouble communicating and
repetitive movements such as rocking or hand-flapping. Those with the
disorder are prone to outbursts and may have trouble with changes in
their environment.
The dogs are trained to be a calming
influence, providing a constant between home, school and other new
places. Sometimes, as in Kaleb’s case, the dogs are tethered to
children to prevent them from running off in dangerous situations.
“It’s done so much more than we thought
it could,” said Kaleb’s mother, Nichelle Drew. “We want Kaleb to be
able to experience more of life,” and the dog has helped him do that,
she said.
Chewey does not react when Kaleb “throws
a fit” during times of transition from one activity to another, which
calms him much more quickly, Drew said.
The tether fitted around Kaleb’s waist
helps the dog stop Kaleb from running into traffic at pickup time, as
he is prone to do.
Under the federal Americans with
Disabilities Act, “a person with autism would be considered a person
with a disability in nearly all cases, and a service animal is any
guide dog, signal dog or other animal individually trained to provide
assistance to someone with a disability,” said Alejandro Miyar, a
spokesman for the Department of Justice.
Miyar declined comment on specific cases
but said schools are required to make accommodations for disabled
students to use a service animal. Illinois is among several states with
similar laws.
Schools, though, can argue that the
animals do not provide a functional service. Wright said Kaleb’s school
already provides him with adequate special services. Officials believe
Chewey is more of a companion or comfort dog, not a true service dog.
Elizabeth Emken, vice president of
government relations for Autism Speaks, said her 17-year-old autistic
son has used a service dog for about two years.
Emken said the dog helps control her
son’s pacing and circling, but the family opted against allowing the
boy to take the dog to school because she did not know if he would be
able to manage the dog effectively.
+ Read more: bit.ly/aqk8s
• • •
RESEARCH
Brain Structure Invests Us
With Sense of Personal Space
bit.ly/A4NJW
IANS Neuro scientists have pinpointed
the brain structure regulating our sense of personal space, possibly
opening the way to a better understanding of autism and other disorders.
The structure, the amygdala - a pair of
almond-shaped regions located in the brain - was previously known to
process strong negative emotions such as anger and fear and is
considered the seat of emotion in the brain.
However, it had never been linked
rigorously to real-life human social interaction.
The scientists, led by Ralph Adolphs,
psychology and neuroscience professor and post-doctoral scholar Daniel
P. Kennedy, at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), were
able to make this link with the help of a unique patient, a 42-year-old
woman known as SM, who has extensive damage to the amygdala on both
sides of her brain.
“SM is unique, because she is one of
only a handful of individuals in the world with such a clear bilateral
lesion of the amygdala, which gives us an opportunity to study the role
of the amygdala in humans,” says Kennedy, who led the study.
SM has difficulty recognising fear in
the faces of others, and in judging the trustworthiness of someone, two
consequences of amygdala lesions that Adolphs and colleagues published
in prior studies.
During his years of studying her,
Adolphs also noticed that the very outgoing SM is almost too friendly,
to the point of “violating” what others might perceive as their own
personal space.
“She is extremely friendly, and she
wants to approach people more than normal. It’s something that
immediately becomes apparent as you interact with her,” says Kennedy.
Previous studies of humans never had
revealed an association between the amygdala and personal space.
+ Read more: bit.ly/A4NJW
• • •
TREATMENT
Removing The Barriers of Autism
Children with autism use alternative keyboard to communicate with their
families and their world
bit.ly/ZjnUs
Autism can build a wall of poor
communication between those struggling with the condition and their
families. While a personal computer can help bridge the divide, the
distraction and complexity of a keyboard can be an insurmountable
obstacle.
Using a unique keyboard with only two
"keys" and a novel curriculum, teachers with Project Blue Skies are
giving children with autism the ability to both communicate and to
explore the online world.
At the heart of the project is a device
called the OrbiTouch. Human-factors engineer Pete McAlindon of BlueOrb
in Maitland, Fl., conceived of the concept behind the OrbiTouch more
than a decade ago as a way to prevent carpal tunnel syndrome and
provide computer access to people with limited or no use of their
fingers.
Developed with the support of two
National Science Foundation (NSF) Small Business Innovation Research
awards (9661259 and 9801506), the concept of representing keyboard
strokes with paired movements was critical to the design from the start.
"If you are unable to use a keyboard and
mouse effectively or at all because of a physical disability, what
chance do you have of using a computer?," asked McAlindon. "The
OrbiTouch is designed to keep people with physical or developmental
disabilities connected to their computers."
The Project Blue Skies curriculum is
based on the functions of the OrbiTouch, which allows a user to input
letters, symbols and any other command by independently manipulating
two computer-mouse shaped grips forward, back, diagonally and to the
sides.
For people with carpal tunnel syndrome,
as well as other hand and finger ailments, the motions driving the
OrbiTouch are far kinder than those for a keyboard.
With Project Blue Skies, the hardware is
matched to lesson plans, training aids such as games, and assessment
tools. The two-grip device is ideal for people with autism because it
is less distracting than a keyboard and does not require finger motion.
+ Read more: bit.ly/ZjnUs
• • •
Possible Cure For Peanut Allergy Discovered: Peanuts
By Loz Blain bit.ly/35Skcq
Peanut allergies are very common -
something like one in every 200 children will suffer from some sort of
reaction, and while roughly 100 people per year die as a result,
peanuts are still thought to be the most prevalent food-related cause
of death. Certainly, for those afflicted, it's a huge annoyance to be
constantly checking labels and asking at restaurants just to make sure.
So it's good to hear that Duke University researchers are making
progress on a cure - or at least a therapy for reducing the effects of
peanut exposure.
The cure for peanut allergy, at least
for some people, appears to be ... peanuts. Peanut flour, taken daily
in tiny and incrementally increasing doses, can help the body build up
a tolerance to the point where sufferers can eat them without suffering
any effects.
Many peanut allergy sufferers experience
anaphylaxis - a severe allergic reaction - which is at the extreme end
of the allergic spectrum. Symptoms may include generalised flushing,
difficulty in breathing and can result in cardiac arrest and death.
Common causes of anaphylaxis include
foods such as peanuts, tree nuts, sesame, fish, shellfish, dairy
products and eggs. Non-food causes include wasp or bee stings, natural
latex (rubber), penicillin or any other drug or injection.
Duke University, in association with the
Arkansas Children's Hospital, has been working on studies in which
children with known peanut allergies were given precisely measured
doses of peanut flour with their food each day. Starting with the
lowest possible dose that brings no adverse reaction (sometimes as
little as a thousandth of a peanut), the children slowly increased
their exposure over the course of two weeks.
Peanut allergies are very common -
something like one in every 200 children will suffer from some sort of
reaction, and while roughly 100 people per year die as a result,
peanuts are still thought to be the most prevalent food-related cause
of death. Certainly, for those afflicted, it's a huge annoyance to be
constantly checking labels and asking at restaurants just to make sure.
So it's good to hear that Duke University researchers are making
progress on a cure - or at least a therapy for reducing the effects of
peanut exposure.
The cure for peanut allergy, at least
for some people, appears to be ... peanuts. Peanut flour, taken daily
in tiny and incrementally increasing doses, can help the body build up
a tolerance to the point where sufferers can eat them without suffering
any effects.
+ Read more: bit.ly/35Skcq
[Thanks to Richard Black.]
• • •
MEDIA
Could Vaccines Given To Young Children Cause Autism?
WKTV – bit.ly/tgXWi
Dr. Andrew Wakefield is the first doctor
who suggested a possible link between vaccines and autism.
The British doctor tells Matt Lauer that
he is only going to keep fighting to prove to the world his research is
the truth - research that says some children's immunizations cause
autism.
"What the authorities need to realize,
the children are not going away, their parents are not going away. So
we need to get on and deal with it," said Dr. Wakefield.
Many parents, even here in the U.S. have
jumped on the studies bandwagon. And even though newer studies haven't
backed him up, Dr. Wakefield refuses to back down.
Helen Stepowany, the Executive Director
of The Kelberman Center for Autism in Utica says the overall research
does not show that there is a link between vaccines and autism.
She said the Centers for Disease Control
and the American Academy of Pediatrics both agree there is no link.
However, she does value the British doctor's work.
"The thing that has happened because of
this hypothesis, is it has raised a level of discussion about vaccine
and what is the cause, the reason for autism," Stepowany said.
+See video: bit.ly/tgXWi
• • •
LETTERS
Gas Bags
The "chambers" mentioned in this
article, Hyperbaric Chamber: Healthy Or Hype? bit.ly/suluZ , are not
chambers at all. They are "bags". And they make people rich because
they are not actually a chamber at all. They skate on the coat tails of
what real hyperbaric chambers do. It is sad that the community is once
again mislead and this time by our own. The truth must be told. Bags
that go to max 1.3ata are NOT hyperbaric chambers. Not by far.
- Kerri
Research Money
I am continually amazed at the amount of
dollars spent on "research", while there never much spent on "how to
help" areas.
-Jo Bancroft-Deahl