Preschool Autism Communication Trial (PACT)

学前自闭症沟通试验 (PACT)

• 批准号: G0401546/1
• 负责人: Jonathan Green
• 金额: $ 168.05万
• 依托单位: University of Manchester
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2006
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2006 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=G0401546%2F1
• 关键词: Preschool; Autism; Communication; Trial; PACT

Autism is a severe and chronic childhood disability affecting families from early in childhood through the lifespan. Many claims have been made for effective treatments for autism, but surprisingly (given the importance of the disorder and the progress that has been made in understanding it), there has very little systematic research evidence to support effective treatments. Families and user groups have been vocal in calling for more research on treatment, and statutory agencies have been placed under escalating legal pressure through educational tribunals to provide intensive, costly but often quite untested interventions. This study would represent a significant enhancement of the evidence for effective treatment. It tests a treatment that is aims to enhance parent child communication in autism and the social and language development of the child. Families attend sessions with a therapist every two weeks for 6 months to learn new ways of understanding and communicating with their autistic child, with monthly booster sessions for a further 6 months. Similar treatment models have been applied to other kinds of communication disorder with good results. The study will randomly allocate 144 children in three representative sites across the UK (Manchester, Newcastle and London) to a group receiving routine clinical care in the community and another group receiving routine clinical care but with the addition of this communication intervention. Our pilot study using the same design on a single site has shown very promising value of adding this additional component to routine care. We will also study the cost effectiveness of the treatment. This treatment is not too intensive (with about 1.5 hours of therapist time and 3.5 hours of parent homework time weekly) and for this reason it would be possible to extend it practically into local health services. Because the treatment helps communication between parent and child, we find that it improves parental sense of competence and involvement with their child as well as the child?s development. These are key features identified in our focus groups with parents that are central to what families want from a treatment for Autism.We are collaborating with the National Autistic Society in this study and are conducting focus groups with service users to identify the best ways of measuring treatment outcomes that matter to families. We will disseminate information about this study and its results through the NAS, other newsletters and professional meetings.

自闭症是一种严重且慢性的儿童残疾，从童年早期到一生都会影响家庭。人们对自闭症的有效治疗提出了许多主张，但令人惊讶的是（考虑到这种疾病的重要性以及在理解它方面所取得的进展），几乎没有系统的研究证据来支持有效的治疗。家庭和使用者团体一直直言不讳地呼吁对治疗进行更多研究，法定机构通过教育法庭承受着不断升级的法律压力，要求其提供密集、昂贵但往往未经检验的干预措施。这项研究将显着增强有效治疗的证据。它测试了一种旨在增强自闭症亲子沟通以及孩子的社交和语言发展的治疗方法。家庭每两周参加一次治疗师课程，为期 6 个月，学习理解自闭症孩子并与其沟通的新方法，并在接下来的 6 个月内每月进行强化课程。类似的治疗模式已应用于其他类型的沟通障碍，并取得了良好的效果。该研究将英国三个代表性地点（曼彻斯特、纽卡斯尔和伦敦）的 144 名儿童随机分配到一组接受社区常规临床护理和另一组接受常规临床护理但增加了这种沟通干预。我们在单个地点使用相同设计的试点研究表明，在日常护理中添加这一附加组件具有非常有前途的价值。我们还将研究治疗的成本效益。这种治疗不太密集（每周大约 1.5 小时的治疗师时间和 3.5 小时的家长作业时间），因此可以将其实际上扩展到当地的卫生服务。由于该治疗有助于父母与孩子之间的沟通，因此我们发现它可以提高父母的能力感、对孩子的参与感以及孩子的发展。这些是我们与家长进行的焦点小组中确定的关键特征，这些特征对于家庭对自闭症治疗的期望至关重要。我们在这项研究中与国家自闭症协会合作，并与服务使用者进行焦点小组讨论，以确定衡量对家庭重要的治疗结果的最佳方法。我们将通过 NAS、其他新闻通讯和专业会议传播有关这项研究及其结果的信息。