The Treating Autism International Conference is two days of information, support and meeting people. Our conference is for parents, carers, people with ASD, and professionals—all of whom can learn about a wide variety of approaches that can improve health, learning, and quality of life for people with autism. As well as gathering information, delegates can find new resources, widen their social circle of people traveling the same path, and take some time to relax and enjoy themselves. Two days of high quality but affordable information and networking could make a big difference to the future. We hope you invest your time with us.

BUY CONFERENCE TICKETS HERE
Ticket sales will close on 7th June, book now to avoid disappointment!!

FRIDAY JUNE 17
7pm-11pm: Meet and Greet in the Bar in the Lancaster Hotel (Cash Bar, everyone welcome).

DAY 1: SATURDAY 18 JUNE

Day one of our conference has two different tracks for some of the morning and afternoon sessions (see graphic below). When you have booked your ticket, we will contact you for your choice for each track in each session. Please be advised that the places for each session are limited and will be allocated on a first-come first-served basis.

Click here for the full schedule of talks with timings.

Saturday Morning Track A Presentations

An introduction to Relationship Development Intervention (RDI). Sharon Bradbrook-Armit
Sharon Bradbrook-Armit found herself immersed in the world of autism due to her daughter’s diagnosis in 1995. Sharon was trained in ABA; shadowed her daughter within school; and trained members of her ABA team, but major gaps in her daughter’s learning drove her to continue to search for more answers. In 2004 she came across ‘Solving the Relationship Puzzle’ by Dr. Gutstein, watched the RDI educational video and swiftly signed herself and her husband up for a Parent Workshop and services from a US RDI Consultant. Driven by the changes seen in her daughter she wanted to bring RDI to the UK for others to also benefit and began RDI Consultant training in 2005. Sharon is the founder of Thinking in Shades of Grey Ltd and works with families locally and long-distance as well as with the Bright Futures School. She is studying child and youth development and has had the pleasure of being part of the team working with Dr. Gutstein on developing the Dynamic Intelligence Curriculum. Her presentation will look at the research behind the practice, how RDI addresses core deficit areas, parental empowerment, development of the ASD child’s growth seeking mind, and what an RDI programme entails.

DIR/Floortime – Using joyful interactions to support development and fulfillment. Denise Wilson, MSc.
DIR® stands for Developmental, Individual Differences, Relationship-Based and coaches adults in the child’s life in order to support the child to master key developmental capacities for health emotional and intellectual growth, include being calm and feeling comfortable in their bodies, initiating and responding in two-way purposeful communication, and many more. The child develops an understanding of themselves and the world through long chains of back and forth interactions with their caregivers. Denise Wilson, MSc, is a DIR/Floortime Training Leader and runs courses nationally and teaches on the ICDL international online programme. She has been a children’s occupational therapist for 21 years, with further training in sensory integration therapy, neurodevelopmental therapy and sound-based therapy. She is also a qualified play therapist. She has a private practice in Oxfordshire.

Modern ABA: what can it offer to families?  A brief exploration of modern Applied Behaviour Analysis and its use with individuals with autism and their families. Risca Solomon, MSc, BCBA
Risca’s family have fostered an individual with autism for the past 15 years. This inspired Risca to complete a Masters degree in Positive Approaches to Challenging Behaviour. Risca went on to form Skybound Therapies, a multidisciplinary team providing services to children, adolescents and adults with autism and related conditions. Risca is a Board Certified Behaviour Analyst.

An introduction to Intensive Interaction. Sara Moroza-James
Sara Moroza-James is an Intensive Interaction coordinator and the mother of Tom who is 13 and has a diagnosis of autism. Tom benefitted so much from I.I. that Sara trained as a coordinator and now delivers workshops and training both to parents and in schools. Sara has written a book on I.I., regularly writes a blog and runs the Facebook group “Intensive Interaction for parents”. Delegates will learn why Intensive Interaction, a nurturing, child-centred, play-based therapy, works to help children learn and develop more typically via relationships and play. Video footage will demonstrate what this approach can look like and delegates will learn the underlying foundations of implementing Intensive Interaction.

Introduction to the Rapid Prompting Method. Alex Hopwood and Sue Finnes
The Rapid Prompting Method (RPM) is a teaching method which adapts to take into account the unique sensory profile of different learners. The fundamental belief is that all autistic people are intelligent and capable of learning—the main issue they face is not being able to demonstrate their intelligence in a ‘neurotypical’ way. Developed by a mum, Soma Mukhopadhyay, RPM is about building skills that will enable the student to express their learning, reasoning, opinions and thoughts. RPM can be adapted to an age of student, from very young to adult, and to any type of learner, from the verbal who gets stuck in familiar scripts to non-verbal who may have severe motor challenges. Alex and Sue will also be presenting “How to get started with the Rapid Prompting Method (RPM)” workshop in the afternoon (see track C, below).

Saturday Morning Track B Presentations

Autism—Beyond the Basics. Taking a closer look at the advanced and novel approaches in treating autism. Stella Chadwick BSc (Hons) mBANT CNHC
Stella is a Clinical Nutritionist and Specialist in Autism Spectrum Conditions. She has trained extensively in the principles of Functional Medicine, which assesses and addresses the underlying causes of conditions, as well as Genetics and Nutritional Genomics which assesses the relationship between human genome, nutrition and health. Stella is committed to achieving optimum health for children and young adults on the autism spectrum, as well as those with behavioural and learning difficulties, and food and chemical sensitivities. She will be taking a closer look at some of the more complex and often-overlooked issues in autism, alongside available tests and treatments, including Pyroluria, Lyme disease and co-infections, and interpreting and making use of 23andMe genetic tests.

Special yoga for autism. Jo Manuel, Special Yoga Foundation
Jo Manuel is the Founder of Special Yoga Foundation and UK’s leading teacher trainer for therapeutic yoga, with over 25 years of experience working with children with special needs, including autism. Special yoga is a therapeutic intervention based on classical yoga movements adapted appropriately, breathing techniques, deep relaxation, as well as sound, rhythm, sensory integration techniques and massage. Jo will present on the potential of those practices to take the child or adult with autism out of stress and into a relaxed state creating the optimum condition for the possibility of positive change, such as reduction in stress and anxiety and improvements in resilience, self-regulation, balance, motor planning and control, immune function and quality and quantity of sleep. Jo will also discuss how this therapy can benefit the whole family and reduce high levels of stress experienced by parents.

Saturday Afternoon Presentations for ALL Delegates

Tui Na massage therapy for autism. Leonid Rozman, Tui Na Centre
Tui Na is an oriental massage therapy that has been used since ancient times as a division of traditional Chinese medicine. In addition to being used to address physical problems, regular and targeted massage and touch-therapy in general has been shown to stimulate production of calming hormones and regulate sensory processing. Tui Na massage protocol for autism has been developed by Leonid Rozman through his desire to support his own son’s development and improve his quality of life, and to help address various problems prevalent in autism, such as gut, sleep and digestive issues, and speech and articulation problems. Prior to this Leonid had over thirteen years of experience in Eastern philosophies and bodywork. Tui Na massage is holistic and can be used effectively in combination with behavioural and other therapies for autism. In addition, practicing this massage daily can further strengthen the special bond that parents have with their child, and so reduce parental stress and improve their own wellbeing.

To n=1, and beyond. John Rodakis, N of One Autism Research Foundation
John Rodakis is the founder of the US-based non-profit: N of One: Autism Research Foundation. He has a background in molecular biology and spent much of his career doing medical venture capital investing. After his own son was diagnosed with autism, Mr Rodakis started N of One to bring additional funding to promising research in the hope of generating breakthroughs in our understanding of the biology of autism. “After our son was diagnosed, like many parents we began meeting with doctor after doctor but got few answers and little hope. I spent hundreds of hours reviewing medical literature and meeting with top researchers all around the world and it soon became apparent that we actually knew quite a bit about autism, but that some of the most promising theories were not being well funded because they did not fit neatly with the conventional views of autism. I viewed the funding and allocation system as an impediment to significant breakthroughs in research. I knew there had to be a better way and I knew there were many people around the world touched or concerned about the alarming rise of autism and our lack of answers who would like to help. N of One grew out of the desire to get funding to the most promising research to get the answers that these children deserve.” Mr Rodakis will speak on a variety of topics including: his family’s personal journey from diagnosis to research advocate, ways parents can assess and monitor their own child’s condition (the n=1 approach), current directions and promising research in autism, what parents can do to follow, understand, advocate for better scientific research.

Saturday Afternoon Track C Presentation

How to get started with the Rapid Prompting Method (RPM). Alex Hopwood and Sue Finnes
Sue Finnes has been running a full-time home-based programme for her son for the last 10 years. Christopher, now aged 17, has autism, is non-verbal, has sensory issues and dyspraxia. Sue has been teaching Chris using the Rapid Prompting Method (RPM) since 2011 and has completed the first level training with Soma Mukhopadhyay. She has been so inspired by what she has seen Chris and other students achieve that she wants to empower more parents to use this method with their children. Sue was previously a Senior Training Manager at Lloyds TSB and is now pleased to be able to use her skills helping others learn this approach. She has set up and moderates an international facebook RPM parent support group and has set up a not- for-profit UK Community Interest Company called ‘Unlocking Voices –Using RPM’. Alexandra Hopwood, who is a qualified primary school teacher, has been working with children and adults with Autism since 2008. Since successfully completing her internship in December 2014 with Soma Mukhopadhyay, who developed RPM, Alex has been providing RPM to students and supporting their families to learn. She is passionate about RPM as it can enable students to demonstrate their intelligence and thoughts.

This practical and interactive session will share video footage of RPM teaching method and provide delegates information they will need to begin using this approach, including: working on skills and how to choose them; what to write down; how to teach spelling; how and what type of prompts to give; and how to optimise the learning environment. Delegates will be ‘walked through’ the process while learning how to personalise RPM to different students and where to find RPM resources. There will be a Q and A session.

Saturday Afternoon Track D

TAble TAlks
Have you ever wanted to spend quality time with people who have been living the same experience as you and maybe borrow their brains for a little while? If so, TA would like to invite you to our inaugural ‘TAble Talks!’  Conversations are a way to discover what you know or don’t know about autism. Our TAble TAlks aim to achieve that discovery of knowledge. This is your chance to freely discuss autism issues and intervention in a safe, welcoming atmosphere via small group/table settings. We want to explore the questions that matter to you. We want to encourage everyone involved in these discussions to contribute their ideas and perspectives, whilst also allowing anyone who wants to participate by simply listening to do so. We all have our own expertise and experiences—and so everyone will have the chance to both learn and teach. This information will also feed into the development of Treating Autism’s future strategy, helping Treating Autism to help you.

 

 

We look forward to getting to know you all better, making new friends and making a difference!

Click here for the full schedule of talks with timings.

SATURDAY EVENING EVENT: Treating Ourselves (ticket holders only)

DAY 2: SUNDAY JUNE 19

Keynote Speech. John Rodakis, N of One Research Foundation
John Rodakis is the founder of the US-based non-profit: N of One. Mr. Rodakis has a background in molecular biology and spent much of his career doing medical venture capital investing. After his own son was diagnosed with autism, Mr. Rodakis started N of One to bring additional funding to promising autism research that did not fit the conventional view of autism but held in the hopes of generating breakthroughs in our understanding of the biology of autism.

Autism, epilepsy and metabolic disorders. Prof Dr Athanasios Evangeliou, Papageorgiou Hospital Thessaloniki
Prof Dr Athanasios Evangeliou is a Chief of Division of Child Neurology and Metabolic Diseases at the Papageorgiou Hospital and a Professor of Child Neurology at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. His main interest in on dietary treatments in energy deficit situations of the brain, like autism, epilepsy, and different neurodegenerative and neurometabolic disorders. Prof Evangeliou will present on identification of metabolic biomarkers in autism with therapeutic relevance, for example biotin, B complex vitamins, probiotics, branched chain amino acids and ketogenic diet. Merits of screening evaluations will be discussed for helping to identify subsets of ASD, providing presenting genetic counselling and treatment options for those disorders for which therapeutic options are available.

Reducing symptoms of autism by addressing dysfunctional GABA: A chloride concentration story. Eric Lemonnier, MD, PhD, University Hospital, Limoges
Dr Eric Lemonnier is a child and adolescent psychiatrist at the University Hospital in Limoges, and is the head of the Expert Autism Center of Limousin. Dr. Lemonnier earned his Ph.D. in Paris in 1993, as well as his DEA in neuroscience. Before the opening of the Expert Autism Center of Limousin he worked in the Research Center for Autism of Brittany, which he helped create. Dr. Lemonnier first worked as a psychiatrist at La Pitié-Salpêtrière in Paris, and then as a general child and adolescent psychiatrist at the University Hospital in Brest. Dr. Lemonnier has authored numerous publications in books and scientific journals. Dr Lemonnier presentation will give an overview of his group’s work towards a novel therapeutic approach to address neurological dysfunction in autism based on the regulation of the brain’s electrical activity, notably modulating intracellular chloride and GABA signalling. Following a successful small-scale treatment trials his group is currently conducting a large scale phase III trial to test the effectiveness of this new treatment agent in regulating GABA function and decreasing symptoms of autism.

Advanced dietary approaches in autism. Angelette Müller, MSc., MSc
Angelette Muller is a Nutrition Therapist and Culinary Health Specialist. She received her MSc in Clinical Neuroscience & Immunology from the University of Surrey, Roehampton; and her MSc in Nutrition Therapy from University of Worcester where she focused her research on nutrition applied to autistic children. She has worked for several years in the field of autism using an integrated approach. She currently runs a private clinic in nutritional therapy helping children and young adults with autism, as well as other health issues. Angelette Müller’s experience includes teaching and lecturing in the area of nutrition. She is also a natural health chef, writer and food photographer.

Symprove Research Report. Sue Simmons, DN Med, CNHC, mBANT, BSc Hons
Sue Simmons has been in practice as a Nutritional Therapist for 12 years and has specialised in helping children and young adults with Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD) for the last 9 years. She is registered with the Complementary and Natural Healthcare Council and is a member of the British Association for Applied Nutrition and Nutritional Therapy (BANT).  Sue will be briefly talking about current research into Symprove probiotic.

“Alternative” treatments for autism in mainstream clinical settings. Prof Dr Athanasios Evangeliou, Papageorgiou Hospital Thessaloniki
Prof Dr Athanasios Evangeliou is a Chief of Division of Child Neurology and Metabolic Diseases at the Papageorgiou Hospital and a Professor of Child Neurology at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. His main interest in on dietary treatments in energy deficit situations of the brain, like autism, epilepsy, and different neurodegenerative and neurometabolic disorders. Prof Evangeliou will present on identification of metabolic biomarkers in autism with therapeutic relevance, for example biotin, B complex vitamins, probiotics, branched chain amino acids and ketogenic diet. Merits of screening evaluations will be discussed for helping to identify subsets of ASD, providing presenting genetic counselling and treatment options for those disorders for which therapeutic options are available.

Full moons, mast cells and channelopathies in autism: Observing symptoms and pursuing treatments. Agnieszka Wroczyńska MD PhD, Medical University of Gdansk
Dr Wroczyńska is a board certified internal medicine specialist. She works as attending physician in the Department of Tropical and Parasitic Diseases and academic teacher in a National Centre of Tropical Medicine, Medical University of Gdansk and has published over 50 articles in peer reviewed journals, conference presentations and book chapters. Since 2014 she has been the physician in charge of her 8 years old son with autism and complex medical issues. Dr Wroczyńska will be offering professional perspective and a personal history of identifying and addressing underlying medical problems in autism, with focus on mast cell activation issues and ion channel dysfunction. Her talk will highlight how atypical manifestations of medical issues, including challenging behaviours together with communication difficulties, may put a person with ASD at risk of psychiatric misdiagnosis, and stress the essential role of parental observations and involvement in treatment. The case described shows that there is at present time enough science to support evidence based treating autism as part of mainstream medicine.

Role of autoantibodies in neurodevelopmental disorders. Dr Ester Coutinho, Oxford University
Having attained her medical degree and specialisation in Neurology in Porto, Portugal in 2012, Esther Coutinho became a DPhil student at the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, under the supervision of Professors Angela Vincent and Paul Harrison. Esther’s research addresses the role of autoantibodies and inflammation in neuropsychiatric disorders, including the effects of mother-to-foetus transfer of autoantibodies in the clinical settings of psychosis and autism. Identifying pathogenic antibodies in mothers of children who later develop these disorders could lead to better understanding of underlying pathophysiology and would help develop new treatment approaches.

Pulling it together and planning for success. Anita Kugelstadt, Chair of Treating Autism

Click here for the full schedule of talks and events with timings.

Brunel University offers reasonably priced accommodation and is easily accessed by train, plane, and car. Delegates will be sent information on booking accommodation when they purchase their tickets. Conference day fees include meal, snacks, tea/coffee/water, delegate bag with goodies and handouts and parking if required. They do not include accommodation.

Treating Autism members can take advantage of large discounts on our conference ticket fees. To learn more about many other benefits and how to join us visit our Membership page

BUY CONFERENCE TICKETS HERE
Tickets start from £35. To book tickets click on the link above