Autism: Unseen problem in the CNMI
The Commonwealth lacks the necessary resources to identify the exact number of children who might be needing medical and educational assistance as problem on autism slowly alerts the community.
Autism is a well-known disorder in the medical field but the Commonwealth is yet to exhaust effort to identify the problem and to get the necessary programs in place to help children with Neurological Spectrum Disorder.
Autism is a broad medical subject described as the inability of a child to communicate verbally or the most common perceived symptom– delayed speech development.
To explore carefully the aspects and concerns on autism, the Parents Association for Children with Autism together with medical experts held a symposium Saturday at the Joeten-Kiyu Public Library. The symposium is first of the four-month awareness campaign on Autism to alert and educate the community on this problem.
The Focus on Autism symposium tackled the various assistance and programs currently being implemented by the Public School System to aid persons diagnosed with autism.
The symposium also ventured on the medical basis, symptoms and the behavioral pattern of children diagnosed with autism.
PACA consultant Jaime Vergara explained that the CNMI had seen in the past the rising number of children with Autism but the community has kept mum on the issue.
But concerns were slowly surfacing in the past years that PACA decided it is time to discuss openly the subject in efforts to aid families who might be needing different assistance and programs for their children with the said disorder.
Some parents, even the PSS, are not aware of the problem until children were diagnosed properly by experts, said Mr. Vergara.
In fact, he added, the symposium is the first attempt of PACA to take a bolder action to redefine the concerns and resolve them through the joint effort of various agencies in the government including the education system.
Mr. Vergara said autism affects the normal development of the brain, impacting communication and social interaction skills, it presents a challenge to medical and educational professionals given the fact that not much is known on how to effectively diagnose and treat people affected by it.
This health issue won’t be recognized until the child reaches the age of three and presented several well-noted behavioral pattern such as language difficulty, repetitive behaviors and obsessions, sensory symptoms, unusual abilities among others.
