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Recent News and Articles on the Keywords: autistic children + biohug + israeli  Related to the article below (Last Update: 5/12/2008)


dBTechno
The "Open Question" On Vaccines and Autism
CBS News, NY -
That's what the parents of autistic children have told me as well. If we can screen children to see which ones might be more susceptible to vaccine side ...
Court Hears More Claims of Vaccine-Autism Link New York Times
Families of Autistic Children to Sue US Over Vaccine Link FOXNews
Media Advisory: Vaccine Court & Autism Media Briefing Emediawire (press release)
Education Week News - Julie's Health Club - Chicago Tribune Blog
all 633 news articles »
Abuse probe at school for autistic children
The Herald, UK - May 11, 2008
Investigations have been carried out and a report submitted to the procurator-fiscal." The school caters for 28 autistic pupils, aged between five and 18.
Police probe abuse claims at top school as head and three teachers ... Glasgow Sunday Mail
Q You ask.. They answer A Sunday People
all 4 news articles »
Unheard of? Think again. Interview with autistic teacher ...
American Chronicle, CA - 53 minutes ago
Geraldine Robertson is a teacher, an autistic teacher, and she teaches autistic children whilst her presence also teaches their non-autistic classmates ...
Bullies hit us with a jab
Mirror.co.uk, UK - May 11, 2008
We are endlessly told by the medical profession that fears over the MMR jab are unfounded, yet there are many parents of autistic children who insist that ...
A road to recovery?
Chicago Tribune, United States - May 11, 2008
Though everyone believes a kidnapped child should be returned, a fierce debate is raging over whether autistic children can?and should?"be recovered. ...
Parents of autistic children twice as likely to have serious ...
CBC.ca, Canada - May 5, 2008
Parents of autistic children are twice as likely to have been hospitalized for a serious mental disorder than the parents of children without the disorder, ...
So much to ?say? about Super Duper vs. Mattel
Business Insurance, IL - May 11, 2008
... company is disputing rights to use the word "say," because delayed speech and undeveloped play skills are common characteristics of autistic children. ...MAT
Autism: Effectiveness of early intervention
Southwest Voice, CA -
Along the way, I managed to get him into various programs that were starting to deal with the odd behaviors that many Autistic children have. ...
Arizona K-12 School Provides Hope and Learning for Autistic Children
EVLiving - May 8, 2008
Responding to the need for schools that specialize in High Functioning Autistic children, Gateway Academy chose Scottsdale Arizona to settle their school. ...
New technologies help autistic children communicate
WBIR-TV, TN - May 9, 2008
At the Pacific Autism Center for Education in Santa Clara, California, each morning begins with a power point presentation, launching a day filled with ...
Source: Google News

[PDF] Does the autistic child have a" theory ofmind -
S Baron-Cohen, AM Leslie, U Frith - Cognition, 1985 - ruccs.rutgers.edu
Cognition, 21 (1985) 37 ? 46 Does the autistic child have a ?theoryof mind??* ... We
have reason to believe that autistic children lack such a ?theory?. ...

Behavioral treatment and normal educational and intellectual functioning in young autistic children -
OI Lovaas? - Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 1987 - content.apa.org
... Citation. Database: PsycARTICLES. [Journal Article]. Behavioral treatment and normal
educational and intellectual functioning in young autistic children. ...

Mechanical, behavioural and intentional understanding of picture stories in autistic children -
S Baron-Cohen, AM Leslie, U Frith - British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 1986 - doi.apa.org
TITLE, Mechanical, behavioural and Intentional understanding of picture stories
in autistic children. AUTHOR, Baron-Cohen, Simon; Leslie, Alan M.; Frith, Uta. ...

AN ISLET OF ABILITY IN AUTISTIC CHILDREN: A RESEARCH NOTE -
A Shah, U Frith - Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 1983 - Blackwell Synergy
... Primed in Grcai Britain. Pefgamon Press Uil. ? 1983 Association for Child Psychology
and Psychiatry. AN ISLET OF ABILITY IN AUTISTIC CHILDREN: A RESEARCH NOTE ...

Some generalization and follow-up measures on autistic children in behavior therapy -
OI Lovaas, R Koegel, JQ Simmons, JS Long - Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 1973 - pubmedcentral.nih.gov
... doi: 10.1901/jaba.1973.6-131. Copyright notice. Some generalization and
follow-up measures on autistic children in behavior therapy 1. ...

Autistic Children -
C Hughes, J Russell - Developmental Psychology, 1993 - eric.ed.gov
ERIC logo. EJ464516 - Autistic Children's Difficulty with Mental Disengagement from
an Object: Its Implications for Theories of Autism. ERIC Home. ...
-

Exploration of the autistic child?s theory of mind: Knowledge, belief, and communication -
J Perner, U Frith, AM Leslie, SR Leekam - Child Development, 1989 - JSTOR
... 26 autistic children with mental ages of 3-13 years were tested on 3 tasks that
are within the capability of 3- or 4-year-old normal children. ...

Autistic children: infancy to adulthood.
M Rutter - Semin Psychiatry, 1970 - ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
1970 Nov;2(4):435-50. Autistic children: infancy to adulthood. Rutter M. MeSH Terms:
Adolescent; Adult; Aging; Autistic Disorder*/therapy; Child; Child Development ...

A longitudinal study of joint attention and language development in autistic children -
P Mundy, M Sigman, C Kasari - Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 1990 - Springer
... Development in Autistic Children I Peter Mundy, 2 Marian Sigman, and Connie
Kasari UCLA Center for the Health Sciences This study ...

Does the autistic child have a metarepresentational deficit? -
SR Leekam, J Perner - Cognition, 1991 - ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
... University of Kent, Canterbury, UK This study examines the claim that autistic children
lack a "theory of mind" because of an inability to metarepresent. ...

Source: Google Scholar

Autistic Children Get An Israeli 'Biohug'
For Raffi Rembrand, necessity was definitely the mother of his invention. An Israeli engineer and father to a son with autism, Rembrand was well aware of the difficulties of raising a child with severe autism.

He had devoured all the information about the well established treatment of deep pressure touch to produce a calming effect in agitated individuals with autism. However, he discovered that most existing devices were more like straightjackets and weren't sensitive to changes in the patient's movement and couldn't regulate the pressure based on the patient's needs or body gauges.

An inventor by nature, Rembrand began tinkering in his home until he came up with the idea of a light, wearable, vest-like calming device that's both portable and non-restraining.
Working through a few prototypes of that 'home remedy' makeshift device has resulted in the BioHug - a vest for both people with autism and and children diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).

The BioHug delivers a mildly pulsating pressure through the use of inflatable cells placed throughout the garment and includes a biofeedback mechanism which automatically regulates the level of stimulation.

According to Center for Disease Control, one out of every 150 children in the US suffers from a disorder which falls somewhere on the autism spectrum, ranging from Asperger's Syndrome on one end to severe autism on the other. ADHD is much more prevalent, however, with millions of children diagnosed with the learning disorder.

"It was very much an improvisational exercise," says Rembrand, describing how he developed the BioHug. "The idea of inflatable bubble cells is used for people with pressure wounds to keep them from getting infected. I took a little from here and a little from there. There wasn't any patent, it was just a nice development,"

"I approached ALUT (the Israeli Society for Autistic Children) and said, 'here's a simple idea which might help the kids - I've tested it on my son, and on other people with autism.'

They were so impressed that they implored Rembrand to take it out of the 'amateur' sphere and develop a scientifically tested, professional device that could be made available to all people with autism. For expert advice, he approached Dr. Einat Gal a clinical researcher at the University of Haifa, who continues to collaborate on the development of the BioHug

Still Rembrand wasn't satisfied. "Everyone told me 'you know this invention is way too simple'. It has a very low technological barrier, so I said OK if this is what needs to be done, I'll add some technology to it - which is how we came to include biofeedback."

According to Rembrand, the device measures the user's stress, and that stress actually controls the BioHug's pressure and pulsation rate. A change in the stress counter will cause adjustment to the pulsation rate and amount of pressure.

Earlier this year, Rembrand founded BioHug Technologies Ltd. to commercialize the device and was accepted into the Chief Scientist of Israel incubator program - via L.N. Innovative Technologies in Haifa.

He also found a kindred soul in Andrew Schiffmiller, a veteran manager and consultant, who took up the position of CEO.
"The BioHug is unique among all other types of pressure-based devices for people with autism because we solve the problem of habituation," Schiffmiller told ISRAEL21c.

"Try it yourself - gently pinch your wrist - you feel it, but if you keep doing it, after a short while you don't feel it anymore. Your body gets used to it. Through the pulsation feature on the BioHug, we reduce the habituation so the sensation of pressure on the user will continue, because it's always changing."

According to Schiffmiller, the original reason Rembrand - who acts as BioHug's chief technological officer - invented the BioHug concept wasn't just to keep his son calm, but to conduct tests on a theory he had researched regarding hearing.

"There's a body of suggestive evidence that people with autism hear differently than other people. When you put a shell to your ear and you think you hear the ocean - it's called otoacoustic emissions - produced by the inner ear itself which is thought to have some role in filtering out background noise," Schiffmiller explained.

"The working theory was that there's a difference in the otoacoustic emissions of people with autism - if that's true and you can quantify it, then you can have a purely empirical way of diagnosing autism - even in infants."

But the problem is, how do you get naturally fidgety people with autism to sit till long enough to conduct an ear exam? And according to Rembrand and Schiffmiller, the BioHug is the solution.

They're still revising the design of the BioHug before they actually begin clinical testing, discussing issues of whether the compressor will be in the vest or an accompanying backpack and other design issues. But according the feedback they've received from students with autism who've tried the device and from professionals in the field, they're on the right track.

"Every time we build a prototype, we go back to the Horsha school for children with autism that Rafi has a good relationship with, we give it to the staff, they play with, try it on and give us their suggestions," said Schiffmiller. "Since these are people that work with children with autism every day and they themselves are experienced in the application of the pressure, they've been great sounding boards for us."

"And they're still using my first prototype at the school," added Rembrand.

Both Schiffmiller and Rembrand are confident that the BioHug represents a huge leap in the field of controlled pressure devices for patients with autism. Some devices are based on the principle of weight, where weighted garments place pressure on the user's shoulders. But Schiffmiller claims there are two drawbacks to that type of therapy.

"One is the issue of habituation - after a few minutes, you don't really feel it. And two, in order to be effective, the total weight needs to about 10 percent of the wearer's body weight - that's heavy, especially if you're talking about adults."

And then there's a device invented a decade ago by Temple Grandon - a very high functioning person with autism in the US - who created a machine that's based on restraining chute for cattle.

"As a child, she always craved pressure. Once when she was visiting her uncle's farm, she saw him using a restraining chute for the cattle, and she climbed in and found that the pressure helped calm her," explained Schiffmiller.

"Her device is large and cumbersome - about 350 pounds and uses an industrial air compressor. What Rafi has done - in essence - is to miniaturize that process into the BioHug."

Depending on the population, the BioHug can function in a number of different ways, says Schiffmiller. For ADHD students, it could be worn at homework time enabling the user to concentrate and stay on task. And with people with autism who sometimes suffer through periods of severe agitation, it's a tool to help them calm down.

"With some some people with autism, the possibility exists that they may hurt themselves, or hurt others, and the BioHug is an effective way to get them to relax," he said.

Rembrand is confident that the BioHug will prove to be a useful device for the families of children with autism. And he only has to look as far as his own son, Jacob, now 23 years old.

"He's my primary beta tester. And if he says it's good, then we know it's good."

By David Brinn
 
 
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