Occupational therapy autistic kids

[sbog]

Hello,

Has some one experience of how Occupational therapy deal with autistic children? My toddler is autistic and they don't want to offer the right support required to help my child in terms of development regarding social skills and playing.

I live in Scotland.

Many thanks

Hi my ds was diagnosed at 3. The only ot involvement was at 5 with school around fine motor skills.

He had salt involved from 2 years old but that was the only outside service

That's crazy! They should do more in terms of early intervention!

Do you know who help them to develop communication and social skills? Is it the Speech and language therapist?

OT can help with functional skills, like writing or dressing, and also with sensory issues.
SALT are the people who help with language and communication, including social interaction.

I would expect the Additional support for Learning team at the council to support in early years. There's usually an early years team. Speech and Language can help and you can usually self refer.

May be worth posting on Scotsnet.

Maybe the system in Scotland is different?

Could you contact your GP and ask which professional deals with which services, then ask for referrals to different professionals for in-depth assessment of your child's needs.

In England, a paediatrician oversees a team, comprising Ed Psych for any problems with the way kids learn, from dyslexia to autism, OT for physical interventions fir conditions like dyspraxia and sensory issues, SLT for communication, but all of the professionals' roles overlap so one may also deal with another's specialities, and since I was involved with the system, a lot of the services in England that were provided on the NHS are now only available via going private.

Ok, so is it the Speech and language therapist that deal with matters regarding communication and social skills?

Yes thats the SALT role.

My ds's ot and salt have always worked together to implement any strategies. He has complex needs and his needs are very intertwined. He's 13 now and has had both ot and salt intervention since he was two years (differing amounts due to moving from nhs to inde therapists but for the last six years weekly salt and at least monthly ot and monthly meetings as a team with school and myself).

When I say intertwined what I mean is his sensory, motor and communication skills are such that to look at one you have to work on the others too eg:-

When he was younger he was completly non verbal and we introduced a high tech comms aid/ aac. In order to use this we had to work on his find motor skills and use a button guard so he could press the right picture/ button. He also had to be in a place where he was regulated sensory wise. Although we did use his like of spinning to get him to start to use the device by spinning him on a chair and modeling 'more' to get him to repeat.

As his needs changed and what we worked on changed we still needed to look at all needs at once. So for toileting, looking at visual aids, motor skills needed and if sensory needs played a part.

All professionals working with your son should be working as a team rather than on their own.

Occupational therapy should also include social skills but is more widely understood to mean just motor skills.

Everything about getting appropriate care for autistic kids is a nightmare. Can you afford to go private?

Well I am aware that the ot work also on social skill and play, but she said me that it something that speech and language therapist does. On the other side the speech and language therapist said that is the ot that deal with social and play skills. I have found a couple of private therapists (Salt and ot) but they have ask me 600£ monthly and I can't afford to pay them for a long period of time. That's why I was enquiring about the support offered by the NHS.

SLTs and OTs are brilliant people and you will find it worthwhile spending time with them. HOWEVER the system in Scotland is very much fixed around you as a parent knowing what to ask for and then giving you as a parent the tools you need. In other words, it's done on the cheap. For SLT, expect a 6 week small group course. If you're very, very lucky it might be one-to-one but that depends on your local authority. OT is similar. Both interventions will be based around teaching you what to do, things like turn taking and games that will encourage basic skills.

Our LA used to run Hanen More Than Words courses, it's worth asking about them. Great course and probably the most useful thing I did.

They used to give us a signposting session after diagnosis in my area where they give you a big list of things to follow up on, if you've recently received a diagnosis again worth asking about that. If there are any parent groups or forums around, join them right away. It's very much about knowing what you need to ask for, knowing what's available - no-one (apart from other parents) tells you anything, you have to go and find it out.

I don't think ehcp's are used yet in Scotland and I'm unfamiliar with if they have an equivalent. Best advice I can think of is find out if their is any law that would force the LA to provide the therapy/ support your son needs rather than you paying for it yourself. In England this is via section f of the ehcp and previously was included in a statement of special educational needs providing it's specified, quantified and detailed.

Services are stretched and underfunded all over the UK, I know many parents myself included that have paid for independent reports in order to get them written into a statement/ plan.

Can you join any Scottish parent sen groups on Facebook which may help guide you or are there any info services that aren't funded by the government or LA? There will be parents that have gone through or are going through similar and willind to help. You may better or advice geared towards Scotland that way.

You're right early intervention is vital.

Sorry just read the post above and realised I've repeated the advice.

Speech yes. Social is school or Sen worker in England.

I will definitely use a private therapist as I have understood for early interventionon autistic toddlers the NHS is not worthy. I think it vital to work on the first ages of a child instead that waiting till they start primary school. Do you know if a SALT therapist work on social and playing skills? I don't want to pay thousands of money if thar is something that they may do as my child main concern regard communication skills too.

My four year old is probably autistic, so say the senco and the paediatrician who is starting his assessment.

The nhs ot couldn't find anything at all to report on. The private ot found 19 pages worth of sensory issues, which really helped us and preschool understand her better. It also helped set the ball rolling for the EHCP and dla which came later.

Some SALTs specifically specialise in social communication skills.

We used one who used the Attention Autism approach and it was transformational for my 5yo

Ds is Autistic he has both speech therapy help with communication and speech.
Ot work with helping with skills like dressing and getting him to eat different foods.
The speech therapist and ot also work together when they are making their plans.

I’m in England so it may be different, but our SaLT only deal with speech difficulties-they wouldn’t really cover anything to do with social skills.

Salt's have different training and different specialisms. If your child is non verbal or has limited communication skills look for one who works with aac (alternative and augmented communication) it doesn't replace communication forever so please don't think if you go down this path your child won't develop communication. It supports it and research shows they're more likely to develop their verbal comms skills if this is implemented. It takes away stress, anxiety and allows them to learn language. It can inc low tech like pecs or high tech devices.

Get a specialist and see what other parents say about them. In England some are able to write reports for tribunal and some really can't and they have to be written a certain way to make the tribunal easier for the parent.

Not all speech therapists specialise in autism. Some specialise in oral dyspraxia (which can be comorbid), others specialise in brain injury.

It's really worth doing some research and asking other parents too. Please don't just settle for the closest or the cheapest.

My son had SALT, they taught PECS (he was non-verbal as a toddler/young child) and we completed the Hanen More Than Words course via the local authority after the paediatrician referred us. Most of the social skills development our son had at that age were from us as family engaging with him and modelling play/speech at home in an environment he was comfortable in. At age 3 when he went to nursery then they also used PECS, staff at nursery and school have interacted with him as part of his personalised learning plan to build those social, emotional and communication skills. Your Health Visitor may also be able to provide information on local resources for the early years and give advice on things like toilet training.