New Center for Autism School Opens

Cleveland Clinic Children’s Hospital Center for Autism opened a new school on the Cleveland Clinic Shaker Campus. The new school was made possible by the generosity of Norma Lerner, and Mort and Iris November. It will enable the Center for Autism to accommodate and educate more children than ever before. The Center for Autism treats children with Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), also referred to as Early Intensive Behavioral Intervention (EIBI), along with some pharmacological treatments. In addition to the school, therapists from the Center for Autism also provide individual, classroom, home and school consultation, and recently launched the Cleveland Clinic Autism Consulting Group to help other organizations incorporate the Center’s treatment practices. The group completed its first out-state-project with the development of the Ozark Center for Autism in Joplin, Missouri, and has begun a developing a new project at the Highlands Regional Medical Center in Kentucky. The Center for Autism began a new research program in 2008, and is working on cross-institute efforts to understand autism spectrum disorder from genetic to behavioral levels. It has formalized its clinical diagnostic program, and began evaluating more children (especially babies) in 2008.