Autism Treatment –Regression, Gut Problems and Autism Part 1

In part 1 of this 2 part series on regression and gut issues in children with Autism we begin discussing the problems often seen. I want to cover some of the issues with children who tend to cycle through problems with their digestive tract and who do not improve. Many kids on the Autism spectrum have yeast and bacterial imbalances, at least this is what I have seen over the years. Concurrently we see a lot of food intolerances as well that also prove to be large contributing factors to both their Autism characteristics as well as their inability to show improvement.

Many children with Autism are placed on various special diets. The special diets can be the low oxalate diet, the specific carbohydrate diet, anti-candida diets, the gluten and casein free diet or a blend of those. And various anti-bacterial, anti-fungal and anti-parasitic therapies can also be implemented. What can be very frustrating for parents and caregivers are the cyclical gains and losses of benefits. A child may do better for a while and then regress back. There can be a lot of questions about how to control yeast, or control bacteria. And it may also feel like you are taking three steps forward and two steps back. I have been a physician specializing in biomedical treatments for Autism since 1998 and in my experience, the majority of the children that have these types of issues suffer from an underlying inflammatory bowel disease.

And I think what is happening here more often than not is that children with Autism suffer from inflammatory bowel disease and it is not being recognized or diagnosed. But when we reduce bowel toxicity through the use of the various anti-fungals, anti-bacterials and anti-parasitics we then reduce the amount of yeast, bacteria and parasites in the body. Then by modifying their diet and removing food they are intolerant to, we also ease the body’s burden and increase their elimination of metabolic waste and feces. We see an improvement because we have improvement in digestion and also a decrease in the absorption of toxic mal-digested food. The improvements can be seen in sociability, improvements in concentration, improvements in behavior, improvements in attention, and sometimes improvements in language as well. We see the improvements last until something else happens like illness, changes in seasons or changes in weather and then you are back to square one. The 2nd part of this series will cover some of the testing that can be done to check for inflammatory bowel disease.