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Saturday 5 October 2013

Parental Placebo Effect in Autism

I have not met that many parents of kids with ASD; from those that I have met it, is clear that often the therapies applied are limited by the more skeptical parent.  There really are no therapies that everyone agrees on.

So it is no surprise that sometimes my wife doubts the value of the therapies I am sharing in this blog.  She would far rather have a homeopathic wonder cure, than use drugs or ABA.  I saw today as an opportunity.  Monty, aged 10 with ASD, had been up half of the night with a virus and his Mum said "don't give him any of your medicines"; "OK" I replied.

By 2pm Monty was in an increasingly bad mood, frustrated,  exhibiting obsessive repetitive behaviours and showing warning signs of mild self injury.

So I mixed him up a Peter cocktail (1.2g NAC, 10 mg atorvastatin and 1mg of bumetanide) in orange juice.  Within 10 minutes things started to change.  Facial expression switched from anger to contented and, most telling of all, he sat at the piano and started to play.  I could not have hoped for a better result. 

After an hour I asked Mum, if she noticed the transformation.  Yes she had and agreed it was remarkable.


Placebo Effect

It is clear that the more involved the parent becomes, the greater is the risk of seeing what you want to see, rather than what is there.  This why nobody generally listens to parents and indeed why doctors are not supposed to treat their children.

It is always good to have a reality check.

I can now move forward to my serotonin and acetylcholine interventions, in the knowledge that previous interventions have past their critical test.



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