Please enjoy OARC’s quarterly newsletter, which includes updates on Autism Awareness Month, events, meetings, news, and publications.

Dr. Gordon discusses his connection to autism, what he's learned from the autism community, current research initiatives at NIH, his experience on the IACC, and more.

The Presidential Proclamation of World Autism Awareness Day highlights the need to recognize and support all individuals on the spectrum through identification and diagnosis and access to care, resources, and services.

In honor of World Autism Awareness Day, the United Nations held a day of observance in New York that focused on the importance of empowering girls and women with autism. Experts and advocates discussed the challenges that girls and women with autism face, such as lack of access to education, lower employment rates, exposure to violence, and barriers to sexual and reproductive health services.

OARC will host a Panel Presentation featuring speakers from Sesame Workshop, the educational non-profit behind the television show Sesame Street, on Julia, a Muppet who has autism. The panel includes Sesame Workshop speakers Jeanette Betancourt, Ed.D., Mindy Fila, and Autumn Zitani, M.A., who will discuss how Julia was created, her role on the show, and her outreach and social impact.

The agenda for the upcoming meeting includes presentations on employment and self-injurious behavior. The 2017 Summary of Advances will also be released.

The INSAR Annual Meeting will feature presentations from prominent autism researchers from all over the world. Researchers will share exciting scientific advances, and several IACC members will attend. Dr. Susan Daniels will co-present with Autistica on the preliminary results of the International Portfolio Analysis.

Scientists have discovered overlap at the molecular level of genes that contribute to risk for ASD, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder. Studying how these genes turn on-and-off in people with these conditions can lead to better treatment. Further details about this study can be found at NIH Research Matters weekly update.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar has designated Ann E. Wagner, Ph.D., as the National Autism Coordinator. As National Autism Coordinator, Dr. Wagner will complement the activities of the IACC by ensuring the implementation of national ASD research, services, and support activities. She is also Chair of the NIH Autism Coordinating Committee.

Children born to women who took folic acid or a daily multivitamin before or during pregnancy were less likely to be diagnosed with autism than children’s mothers who did not take any prenatal vitamins, according to a study funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institute of Mental Health. However, this study does not prove cause-and-effect, and prenatal vitamins cannot guarantee a child will be born without autism.

The 2017 IACC Summary of Advances is a compilation of short, plain language summaries of the top 20 research articles in 2017, selected by the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee. Research articles are grouped according to the seven Strategic Plan question topics.

This report aims to gain a further understanding of guardianship and make recommendations for use by examining guardianship in the context of disability law and policy, examining how people with disabilities are treated in the legal system that establishes guardianship, examining alternatives to guardianship, and making recommendations that align the use of guardianship and alternatives with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

The HHS Office of the Inspector General examined states’ monitoring and reporting of injuries and other critical incidents of people with developmental disabilities living in group homes. OIG partnered with the Administration for Community Living, the HHS Office of Civil Rights, and U.S. Department of Justice to develop Model Practices for improvement.