A parent new to biomed asked this on the KL Biomed Health Forum recently, I wanted to share this with everyone;

Science has not evolved enough at this time to analyse and determine which therapy, treatment, protocol, medication or supplements that will work best for each individual child. So, for every successful or unsuccessful case that you know, we really have to find out what they did, how they did it, who did they consult, was it an MD, a naturopath, an unregistered unlicensed practitioner,  which medication or supplement they did, which protocol, was it the right dosage, was the diet successful, was it the right diet for the child and too many other variables to make a blanket statement that biomed doesn’t work especially if it is based on just 1 child that the person knows. I personally know many children who recovered, improved immensely or progressing nicely. I also know many children who are non-responders to certain treatments, however their parents are so dedicated that they keep trying other protocols or treatments.

Some finally found the right treatments for their child, and some are still on their journey. Take note that not every child will respond in the same way to the same treatment. What is best for my child may not be suitable for yours and vice versa. Did you know that chemotherapy has only a 50% success rate? Yet, 90% of cancer patients are advised to undergo chemo. Some respond amazingly well, for some there were either no improvements or the side effects were so incredibly bad.

There are no 100% success rate in Autism treatments, even the gold standard in recommended therapy for Autism which is ABA therapy doesn’t have such a high success rate. Some children do amazingly well and seem to recover just from ABA alone, but for some, even with the most intensive dedicated therapy for several years, the progress was slow.

The bottom line is, explore every avenue. Do your own research. Take every information or advise with a pinch of salt . You MUST do your own homework, do not expect any shortcuts, Autism is such a complex disorder, our children have been sick for years so don’t expect 2 weeks or 2 months to miraculously cure your child. Be reasonable in your expectations. Be wary of quacks who are out there to scam you. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Just because you hear 1 negative comment, do not let that be an obstacle towards pursuing other alternative treatments. Check your sources, is the person trained or experienced in that particular therapy to make such a judgement? I have the utmost respect for OTs, speech therapists, behavioural therapists and special educationists, they play a huge role towards recovering our children. However, please remember that they specialise in their field. Just as an orthopaedic surgeon specialises in his field, he is not qualified to treat neuro cases.

Some children do experience healing regression, side-effects or die-off reactions. You will encounter all these terms when you read up more on biomed. By educating yourself, you will learn how best to deal with this as well as consult with your doctor. Don’t be afraid of something that MIGHT happen, otherwise you end up doing nothing for your child at all.

Please check out the Autism Research Institute‘s Parent Ratings of various drugs, biomedical/non-drugs and various diets according to Got Worse, No Effect, Got Better and the number of cases. They are working towards updating the parent ratings, the last one published was in 2009. Over 27,000 parents participated in this data http://www.autism.com/pdf/providers/ParentRatings2009.pdf

Biomedical treatments should be done under the care and supervision of an experienced biomedical practitioner. However, parents involvement is crucial, every recovery story we hear, the parents play a huge role in driving the process. KL Biomed parents are certainly not backseat drivers, at times we even try to wrestle away the steering wheel from the doctor:-) For each child that recovered through biomed, each has their own journey which is riddled with failures. We all had many setbacks and wrong turns in our journey, however we keep going. If something doesn’t work, try something else. We face immense hurdles daily in Autism, there is nothing easy or pretty about Autism. You HAVE to put in the hard work to see results, you must commit to the treatment protocol. Even then, there is no guarantee of success.  Keep going to the next level, otherwise you will become complacent and plateau. If DAN protocol biomed doesn’t work for you, then try AC protocol or naturopathy or homeopathy or many of the other treatments available. But you have to start somewhere.

There are no guarantees that biomedical treatments will recover every child, however it is my personal belief that each child is entitled to the best health possible. This may not necessarily mean recovery, but it will improve his quality of life. Too many Autistic children suffer daily from treatable medical ailments, left untreated and passed off as behavioural issue because it is considered part of Autism.

Start every new treatment or therapy with a positive attitude, if you expect failures, you most probably will fail. Keep a positive outlook, I know it’s hard in the midst of so many other people who discourage you. However in this forum, there are many parents who have found success in biomed, even parents who found that biomed failed in their child. BUT the key thing is they keep trying other means. And thanks to them, they expand our knowledge with other treatments that we previously have not explored and many other children improved because of their ‘failed cases’. These dedicated parents face each challenge or so called failure as a lesson learnt, they don’t take it as a setback.

Hope this helps,

Marissa