UK HealthCast: Understanding autism

UK HealthCast is a podcast series featuring interviews with UK HealthCare experts on a variety of health-related topics.

On this edition, Dr. Sarah Critchfield, clinical psychologist with a specialty in pediatrics at Kentucky Children’s Hospital, shares what you should know about autism and how UK HealthCare experts can help.

You can listen to the podcast below, or search for “UK HealthCast” wherever you prefer listening. A summary of Dr. Critchfield’s conversation is also below. 

What is autism and who does it impact mostly?

Dr. Critchfield: Autism can impact anybody. We most commonly see it diagnosed in younger kiddos. Most simply put, it's a brain difference. It's a neurodevelopmental disorder.

So, it occurs really, really early on in development. And it causes some social communication differences. And sometimes, it can cause restricted interests, so maybe really strong interests in certain toys or certain sensory things.

It can also cause repetitive patterns of behavior, and that can be anything from rocking or certain hand movements, to really rigid patterns of behavior and cognition. We see it diagnosed most often in boys, but we're learning more and more about girls on the spectrum.

How has our understanding of autism changed in the last 10 to 20 years?

Dr. Critchfield: Our understanding of autism has changed greatly. And that's because we have so many more clinicians who are researching autism. We have so many more clinicians who are treating it.

So, because of that dedication to research, our understanding of the disorder itself has increased and so has our ability to diagnose with more specificity and more certainty. So, there are rising incidences of autism right now, and that is because of this development in research and understanding what autism can look like.

What are some of the signs and symptoms?

Dr. Critchfield: I think the good thing is that most pediatricians these days when we're taking our kids to their 18-month checkups and their 24-month checkups, they're screening for autism.

Some early things that parents might notice are speech delays, so perhaps the child isn't producing as much functional speech as other children their age. Maybe they're saying ‘mama,’ but they're not using it to actually mean mama, or there's just a lack of speech development.

(Parents) might notice their child is really more interested in playing by themselves than playing with other children, or, "Whenever I try to play with my child, they don't want me to, or they don't know how to respond to my play."

If there’s concern a child could have autism, what should next steps be?

Dr. Critchfield: If we're thinking specifically in this UK system, for younger kids, speak with the pediatrician. And then, the pediatrician can refer to developmental pediatrics. A lot of times the pediatrician is the first line of defense in autism testing.

Speaking to your pediatrician about assessment is always a wonderful step. Many pediatrician offices at the University of Kentucky have psychology built in. So, we have primary care providers who are psychological practitioners so they can even meet with families and say, "Yeah, definitely let's refer to evaluation." And I think that's a really big strength of our healthcare system here.

What makes UK HealthCare the best choice for support?

Dr. Critchfield: I think my favorite thing about UK is that we are attempting to provide access to this specialized care to a lot of Kentucky's underserved populations. So, we're hopefully providing a resource to these rural or underdeveloped communities. We're providing access to services that might not originally be there. So, we're trying with outreach. I think that is really important.

The great thing about our services is that we're offering what other people don't. Especially when we're thinking about autism and neurodevelopmental disabilities, we want to be able to provide expertise and we want to be able to provide reliable care. So, we're fueled by evidence-based research to make sure that we're providing evaluations that are up-to-date and accurate.

I think the University of Kentucky is one of the only developmental pediatric centers in Kentucky. And I think we have a duty to provide these services and we're doing a great job in my opinion.