Occupational Therapy.

Which Therapies Can Help With Autism?

Occupational  therapy helps with activities of daily living and the use of everyday objects, like learning to button a shirt or hold a fork the right way. But it can involve anything related to school, work, or play. The focus depends on the child’s needs and goals.

Occupational Therapy

What does an occupational therapist do?

Occupational therapists work as part of a team that includes parents, teachers, and other professionals. They help set specific goals for the person with autism. These goals often involve social interaction, behavior, and classroom performance.

Occupational therapists can help in two main ways: evaluation and therapy.

The therapist watches children to see if they can do tasks they are expected to do at their ages — getting dressed or playing a game, for example. Sometimes, the therapist will have the child recorded during the day to see how the child interacts with people and things around them. That helps the therapist determine the kind of care the child needs. The therapist might look closely at:

• Attention span and stamina
• Transition to new activities
• Play skills
• Need for personal space
• Responses to touch or other kinds of stimuli
• Motor skills like posture, balance, or manipulation of small objects
• Aggression or other types of behaviors
• Interactions between the child and caregivers

Once an occupational therapist has gathered information, they can develop a program for your child. There is no single ideal treatment program. But early, structured, individualized care has been shown to work best.

Occupational therapy may combine a variety of ideas, including:

• Physical activities, like stringing beads or doing puzzles, to help a child develop coordination and body awareness
• Play activities to help with interaction and communication
• Developmental activities, like brushing teeth and combing hair
• Adaptive strategies, including going through transitions

How does occupational therapy benefit people with ASD?

The overall goal of occupational therapy is to help people with autism improve their quality of life at home and in school. The therapist helps introduce, keep up, and improve skills so people with autism can be as independent as possible.

Occupational therapy may help with:

• Daily living skills such as toilet training, dressing, brushing teeth, and other grooming skills
• Fine motor skills required for holding things in their hands while writing or cutting with scissors
• Gross motor skills used for walking, climbing stairs, or riding a bike
• Sitting, posture, or perceptual skills, like telling the differences between colors, shapes, and sizes
• Awareness of their body and its relation to others
• Visual skills for reading and writing
• Play, self-help, problem-solving, communication, and social skills

By working on these skills during occupational therapy, a child with autism may be able to:

• Develop relationships with children and adults
• Learn how to focus on tasks
• Learn how to delay gratification
• Express feelings in more appropriate ways
• Play with other children
• Learn how to self-regulate

How can someone get OT services for autism spectrum disorder?

Occupational therapy services are available privately, through a statewide early childhood intervention program, or at school. Public law requires schools to provide certain types of occupational therapy to people who need it. Private insurance also usually covers OT.  Medicaid may cover occupational therapy for autism, even for families with higher incomes. School-based OT usually works to complement educational goals, like improving handwriting, so the child can keep up by taking notes. Private therapy will be more medically intensive.