There are numerous ideas about how to
treat self injurious behavior (SIB) associated with autism. ARI (the former
home of Defeat Autism Now) have just had their take on the subject published.
In this blog we have seen that Tyler
has developed a BCAA (branch chained amino acid) therapy, based on the idea of Acute Tryptophan Depletion, to
control his son’s type of self injury.
The silver bullet for my
son’s summer time raging and self-injury continues to be the L-type calcium channel blocker
Verapamil.
I think many people will
be skeptical of both BCAAs and Verapamil, which is entirely understandable.
Unlike other aspects of autism, which are hard to measure, self-injury is
really easy to measure and so you know when you have cracked the problem; what
other people think tends not to matter.
Now that Monty, aged 14
with ASD, has moved to secondary/high school the routine has changed a little
and his assistant forgets to give him his midday dose of verapamil.
On the days she forgets,
between 4.00pm and 4.30pm Monty starts to punch himself. On all other days and during the
entire summer there has been no sign of self injury.
So when asked is it
really necessary Monty keeps taking his pills, my answer remains yes. In the case of verapamil I now have further
evidence that after more than three years of use, his pollen allergy driven self
injury continues to be entirely controllable using this therapy.
I do not know what ARI
have put forward in their book. If your child has SIB that does not respond to
whatever therapies you have tried, it might well be a helpful read.
Other readers have noted GI and behavioral improvement from Verapamil and our doctor reader Agnieszka did try and collect case reports, but it seems parents are more interested in reading reports than writing them.
Other readers have noted GI and behavioral improvement from Verapamil and our doctor reader Agnieszka did try and collect case reports, but it seems parents are more interested in reading reports than writing them.