Do even kids with HFA need ABA therapy? What are the options and alternatives?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:ABA is discrete trial training, hence the repetition and the need for a lot of hours.

You can't do it in a couple hours a week.

Sure you can. If the goals are well defined and the child has good verbal skills and high IQ. 3-4 hours of ABA a week would be max for my kid. Even 1 hour would be helpful (the goals would also be worked on at home.)

Most companies won't bother with this. Not worth their time or efforts

And that would be an indicia of a practitioner I did not want to work with.

I had to chuckle at this. What do you mean? ABA companies send therapists out to homes. They can’t be driving all the way to your home just to bill a one hour session, just to drive out to another place to do another 1 hr session. It’s not good business.

Op- a lot of ABA groups/ psych groups/ot clinics have weekly social skills classes, and of course there is individual ot and st.
But I will say, I know a highly intelligent kid with mild asd/severe adhd who started ABA in tween years and it’s been amazing for him. 15 hrs a week.

You’ll have to hire an independent BCBA if you want limited hours. All the companies we talked to wanted at least a 15-hour weekly commitment and they had waiting lists.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://thefloortimecenter.com/

Not sure why you posted this? Floor time is the exact opposite of ABA. We also had not great experiences with the local floortime centers and would not recommend

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:ABA is discrete trial training, hence the repetition and the need for a lot of hours.

You can't do it in a couple hours a week.

Sure you can. If the goals are well defined and the child has good verbal skills and high IQ. 3-4 hours of ABA a week would be max for my kid. Even 1 hour would be helpful (the goals would also be worked on at home.)

Most companies won't bother with this. Not worth their time or efforts

And that would be an indicia of a practitioner I did not want to work with.

I had to chuckle at this. What do you mean? ABA companies send therapists out to homes. They can’t be driving all the way to your home just to bill a one hour session, just to drive out to another place to do another 1 hr session. It’s not good business.

Op- a lot of ABA groups/ psych groups/ot clinics have weekly social skills classes, and of course there is individual ot and st.
But I will say, I know a highly intelligent kid with mild asd/severe adhd who started ABA in tween years and it’s been amazing for him. 15 hrs a week.

15 hrs a week would be complete overkill for my kid. All other types of therapy are done an hour or two a week (OT, ST, psychological). The idea that you have to do 15 hrs/week of ABA comes from the business model, not anything inherent to the therapy. Luckily there are independent BCBAs that are more flexible and also OTs that use similar behavioral approaches.

Agree! This is also a *direct result* of states mandating that insurance companies cover autism services. This is the business model...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:ABA is discrete trial training, hence the repetition and the need for a lot of hours.

You can't do it in a couple hours a week.

Sure you can. If the goals are well defined and the child has good verbal skills and high IQ. 3-4 hours of ABA a week would be max for my kid. Even 1 hour would be helpful (the goals would also be worked on at home.)

Most companies won't bother with this. Not worth their time or efforts

And that would be an indicia of a practitioner I did not want to work with.

I had to chuckle at this. What do you mean? ABA companies send therapists out to homes. They can’t be driving all the way to your home just to bill a one hour session, just to drive out to another place to do another 1 hr session. It’s not good business.

Op- a lot of ABA groups/ psych groups/ot clinics have weekly social skills classes, and of course there is individual ot and st.
But I will say, I know a highly intelligent kid with mild asd/severe adhd who started ABA in tween years and it’s been amazing for him. 15 hrs a week.

15 hrs a week would be complete overkill for my kid. All other types of therapy are done an hour or two a week (OT, ST, psychological). The idea that you have to do 15 hrs/week of ABA comes from the business model, not anything inherent to the therapy. Luckily there are independent BCBAs that are more flexible and also OTs that use similar behavioral approaches.

I agree with this if you are also incorporating the goals in the rest of the day/working on them outside of therapy which not everyone does. But once a week of any therapy or lesson of any kind really without anything additional is going to be slow going.