The Department of Mental health of the School of Nursing and Midwifery in collaboration with Autism Compassion Africa has organised a seminar on Autism and Applied Behaviour Analysis

The workshop was aimed at enlightening  health practitioners and students on Autism, managing and supporting families of children with such disorders.

The speaker, Mrs. Whitney Hammel, took participants through the history of Autism spectrum disorder, the diagnoses, treatment considerations and applied behavior analysis.

She explained that there was no known cause of Autism at present adding, “It is biologically or genetically based on developmental disorder”. Mrs. Hammel indicated that Autism was the second most common developmental disorder and indicated that early diagnosis and intervention could reduce cost of lifelong care by 66%.

She stated that recent increase in prevalence might be due to “changes in diagnostic criteria, differences in experimental methods, increased awareness and awareness of co-morbity with intellectual impairment, average or high intellectual ability and psychiatric disorders”.