From USA Today:

Airline travel has many characteristics that can trigger meltdown in kids with autism, experts say. Among other things, air travel involves breaks in routine, enclosure in tight spaces, crowds, noise, and demands that kids sit still for long periods of time.

What can parents do to reduce the stress? Prepare kids for the trip by sharing photos of airport terminals, planes and destinations. Let kids make small choices, so they feel some measure of control. Bring along familiar books, toys, headphones and snacks. And let the airline know if you’ll need accommodations.

From The Associated Press:

Patient websites enable those with a range of critical and chronic illnesses to provide progress reports and receive support — all without having to repeat details in exhausting phone calls. Medical professionals praise the online tools for addressing the “emotional needs” of patients.

Free online services like CaringBridge and Carepages offer user-friendly formats that allow people to quickly set up sites to share medical and personal news. CaringBridge is supported primarily by donations from users, as well as sponsor fees from hospitals. CarePages also has arrangements with hospitals and sells advertisements.

On both sites, patients and family members share information about treatment and recovery from illnesses, accidents, or other medical crises. “We just think it’s made a huge difference for families,” Alan Goldbloom, president and CEO of Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota, says of CaringBridge.

On ABC Good Morning America, video of an extended interview with Dan Habib, director/producer of ‘Including Samuel.’ The recently released documentary chronicles his son’s journey through elementary school in New Hampshire. Habib explains the philosophy behind the decision to include Samuel in general education classes (he has cerebral palsy), and shares footage of him interacting successfully with classmates.

Interviewer Marysol Castro poses some skeptical questions, which Habib handles with ease.

An excerpt:

Habib: … Disability is part of diversity, just like ethnic diversity and racial diversity. You create a society where that’s accepted as the real world. And kids need to understand this is the real world. Kids with disabilities and adults with disabilities will be living and working alongside them.

… [We want people] to see disability part as an enrichment of our culture — not something we that need to fix. For a while, we always focused on ‘we need to fix Daniel’. Now we realize we just need to accept him as our son, for who he is, and his disability is just part of who he is.

Earlier posts here.

About two-thirds of pediatric cancer survivors experience at least one late health effect of treatment, and for more than one-quarter of survivors it is severe or life-threatening.

From the Los Angeles Times, an extended feature about young adults who have survived childhood cancer only to find that their health is now threatened by the very treatments that once saved their lives

Cancer therapies injure, starve or kill healthy cells along with malignant ones, and as a consequence, survivors have a heightened risk of health problems, including early heart attacks, second cancers, stunted growth and infertility.

… The developing brain — and psyche — can be affected as well. Radiation to the brain can result in a drop of 20 or more IQ points, causing learning disabilities for some. And while some cured youngsters enter adulthood feeling a renewed sense of purpose, others must deal with lingering bitterness and trauma from their treatment, which can emerge as depression or anxiety when they become adults.

… Only recently is the medical community understanding the importance of lifelong health monitoring to help them avoid, or detect early, the host of medical risks that could lie in their path.

Related links:

• Programs for childhood cancer survivors
• Survivors tell of their experiences with childhood cancer

Writing in the Dallas Morning News, columnist Jacquielynn Floyd hangs out at Chili’s restaurant with a group of kids who are enjoying their once-a-month Supper Club. The club was started by pediatric therapist Mary Hawkins, and is designed to help kids with autism make friends and have fun. In the process, they also pick up social skills and learn to navigate a restaurant.

Floyd describes the kids with autism as “quirky” and “relentlessly entertaining,” as their conversation jumps from topic to topic in a way that assures non sequiturs. Most often, Floyd is told, these are kids whose social isolation is painful to them and to their families. But at Supper Club, they feel the “blissful pleasure of belonging.”

Imagine, for instance, being the mom of a boy who came home from school not long ago and miserably reported on his day. In a determined effort to strike up a conversation with a girl in his class, he had volunteered that he liked her handbag. The girl’s response: “Get away from me, you creep.”

Just hearing this story made my heart hurt. In the merciless tribal segregation of the middle-school social order, this sweet-natured, gentle boy (whose mother sadly shared this anecdote) is doomed to permanent outsider status.

At Supper Club, though, these children are very much insiders.

The story is accompanied by a video of the Supper Club. Definitely worth seeing.

From the San Jose [CA] Mercury News, overwhelmingly negative employment figures. Experts say people with disabilities should not reveal their disability on a resume for fear of discrimination.

A report released by Cornell University, in collaboration with the American Association of People with Disabilities, states that 37.7 percent of people with a disability are employed, compared with 79.7 percent of people without disabilities, making a gap of 42 percentage points. People with a disability between the ages of ages 21 and 64 make up 12.9 percent of the working-age population.

Jeff Klare, of Hire DisAbility Solutions in Brooklyn, N.Y., advises against revealing a disability on a résumé because of possible discrimination. Many myths and misperceptions exist about people with a disability. Placing any limitations on a résumé may eliminate any chance of being considered as a potential candidate.

The Bobby Dodd Institute, a nonprofit organization in Atlanta that offers job training and employment opportunities for individuals with physical and mental disabilities, backs Klare’s views. Surveys reveal that 49 percent of respondents falsely believe that disabled persons cannot adequately perform required work duties; 25 percent of individuals surveyed cite lack of knowledge about the disabled as the primary deterrent to hiring.
(more…)

From the Contra Costa Times:

Blake Taylor’s new memoir — one of the first penned by a youth with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder — offers a fascinating and ultimately hopeful glimpse into the childhood challenges shared by 4 million other young Americans.

“I want to change the view that ADHD doesn’t exist or that it’s solely a disability,” says Blake. “It’s a gift.”

The book, called “ADHD & Me: What I Learned From Lighting Fires at the Dinner Table,” arose out of Taylor’s college admissions essay. He is a freshman at the University of California, Berkeley.

Accompanying the story are tips for teens on managing ADHD, as well as a reading list.

Earlier post here.