Clinic Notes: Recovering from Autism

Now there is evidence, some of it anecdotal on You Tube that perhaps 10% of children can recover from autism. Most of these children have received years of Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), which started at a very young age. As I wrote about in an earlier blog previous studies have shown that it may be possible to prevent autism in high-risk toddlers with intensive ABA. While this is good news getting insurance coverage for ABA is still a problem. Blue Cross Blue Shield tells parents in the state where I live that ABA is experimental and not covered while Blue Cross Blue Shield in other states has treatment plan forms and suggest CPT codes to the provider for billing for ABA. Come on these are children's lives we are talking about.