Medical Treatment: Out of Pocket

Once you are not relying on insurance to pay for medical treatment, two major autism treatment pathways open:

The first medical pathway is the educational interventions such as ABA. ABA, and the more psychological techniques such as RDI, PRT, Floortime, Sonrise and CDI, all rely on intensive, one-on-one work with a child. The one-on-one therapies also form a continum from ABA, with its artificial environment of repetitive trials, to programs such as RDI in real world settings with real world social interactions. An expert sets up the program, with parents or assistants doing the one-on-one work with the patient.

Many of these programs have had a lot of success treating individuals with autism, and unfortunately are also very costly. Only military Tricare will cover the cost of such a program, so that most families unfortunately have to pay out of pocket. The Autism Intensive Therapy Providers section covers the few places willing to offer these treatments.

The second pathway many parents explore are the biomedical treatments. Basically these treatments are not covered by insurance because they usually lack FDA approval for autism treatment. Included in biomedical treatments are GFCF diets, hyperbaric oxygen chambers, chelation, and vitamins.