Autism-World

I have read quite a bit about biomedical approaches but am feeling a little confused with all the options out there.  One question that has been bothering me a bit in how to apply all of this to our son (if possible) is that it seems that the theory is that many kids with autism seem to be deficient in certain vitamin/minerals or not handle the gluten and casein well with digestion, so since our son has been tube fed all of his life with a supposedly nutritionally complete formula and also been given a multivitamin, would these deficiencies be applicable?  I do know for a fact that he has “gut issues” since we’ve been struggling with formula intolerance, reflux, malabsorption issues, delayed gastric emptying, etc. etc. etc. his whole life, but since he was a micropreemie he didn’t have a mature digestive system from the start and I have always attributed his problems to this.  We have switched him to a GFCF formula and he does seem to be slowly showing more awareness in several different areas and interest in interacting with people (especially his little brother), but his stools are actually worse than on his previous milk-based formula.  His current formula is an amino acid based elemental formula that has 6% soy oil, so I guess that makes it soy based, but I have not found any other options so far for complete nutrition formulas.  I am really having trouble sorting all of this out in my head and while I want to explore all of our options, I also don’t want to create problems where maybe none existed (these “problem free” areas are few and far between in his life).  I also would not be at all surprised if he has heavy metal issues, so any experiences in that area would be appreciated as well.  When he was discharged home from the hospital at 19 months they caught him up on his vaccines so he got a bunch all at once (yes, this makes me cringe now in hindsight) so I’m sure his little body was overwhelmed way more than it should have been.  I don’t know any medical professionals in this area that are knowledgeable in this approach, though, so if anyone knows of any please do share.  I would feel much more comfortable with a doctor on board before I look explore this much further.  We are in southeast South Dakota.  Hope this makes sense, and thanks for any replies!

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 1st, 2007 at 3:37 pm and is filed under Autism Treatment, What is Autism.