Henny Kupferstein, Ph.D.

🌟 Understanding PTSD in Autistic Youth 🌟

Did you know that post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can often go unrecognized in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder (ASD)? 🤔 This comprehensive review highlights the challenges in identifying PTSD due to overlapping symptoms, communication differences, and diagnostic overshadowing.

Trauma-related symptoms may present as behavioral changes, irritability, or emotional dysregulation rather than typical PTSD symptoms. Standard PTSD screening tools often fall short for autistic children.

Caregiver and educator input, along with adapted screening methods, can improve recognition of trauma-related distress.
Modified interventions, such as adapted cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), are essential for effective management.
Ongoing research is needed to enhance diagnosis and treatment strategies for this population.

Let's work together to ensure that autistic youth receive the compassionate and individualized care they deserve! 💙

Post-traumatic Stress Disorder in Individuals With Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Literature Review This structured narrative literature review examined current evidence on the identification and management of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and trauma-related symptoms in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Literature was identified through searches of PubMed, PsycI...

Shut. It. Down. Six behavioral health providers announced layoffs this month. The headlines say "workforce shortages," "service model changes," or "funding challenges."

But look closer.

• Comprehensive Autism Center (CA): 62 layoffs after states began cutting and scrutinizing Medicaid ABA spending.

• Centria Autism (CA): 48 layoffs after ending California in-home ABA services.

• Aurora Mental Health & Recovery (CO): 111 layoffs explicitly blamed on Medicaid changes.

• Community Healthlink (MA): 78 layoffs tied to financial and operational strain.

• Providence (WA): 40 layoffs tied to a behavioral health restructuring.

• Laurel Ridge Treatment Center (TX): 648 layoffs after CMS terminated its Medicare provider agreement for noncompliance with federal participation requirements.

The common thread is not a sudden drop in autism or mental health diagnoses. Demand remains high.

The common thread is that states and federal agencies are finally confronting the financial reality of behavioral health programs built around ever-expanding Medicaid expenditures, increasingly aggressive billing models, and growing program-integrity scrutiny.

When a business model depends on reimbursement growth that outpaces oversight, layoffs are often the first sign that the money pipeline is changing.

and STOP

6 behavioral health layoffs to know | 2026 - Becker’s Behavioral Health Behavioral health leaders are grappling with a workforce paradox: Demand for services continues to grow, yet funding uncertainty and inadequate reimbursement rates are forcing some providers to reduce staff and scale back services.  Here are six layoffs to know:

If your nonspeaking autistic child, AAC user, or otherwise communication-disabled child has been the victim of a crime, please do not assume the forensic interview process must happen the same way it does for speaking children.

You can ask for reasonable accommodations.

Too often, children are viewed as "uncooperative," "unreliable," or "unable to communicate" simply because professionals do not understand how they communicate. Yet forensic interviewing best practices specifically recognize the need to identify how a child communicates, use appropriate communication supports, consider sensory needs, allow additional processing time, and involve individuals familiar with the child's communication methods when appropriate.

Your child does not lose the right to be heard because they do not speak.

Before a forensic interview, consider requesting accommodations such as:

• use of AAC or other communication supports
• additional processing time
• sensory accommodations and breaks
• interviewers trained in disability communication access
• modifications based on your child's established communication methods
• consultation from professionals who understand autistic communication

Courts, law enforcement agencies, and public entities have obligations to provide communication access and reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities.

If you need help explaining how your autistic child communicates to attorneys, courts, guardians, or other professionals, I provide consultation focused on communication access and reasonable accommodations:

https://doogri.org/services/helping-courts-understand-how-your-autistic-child-communicates/

Autistic children deserve justice. They should not be excluded from it because others fail to understand their communication.

Cameras In Special Needs Classrooms Cameras Protect Children International Association for Spelling as Communication Communication 4 ALL Communication First

Helping Courts Understand How Your Autistic Child Communicates Safeguarding Autistic Children From Unlawful Communication Burdens and Proposing Reasonable Accommodations for Custody and Visitation Orders This service is for families involved in custody or visi…

Parent: "ABA isn't babysitting. It's medically necessary treatment."

Also Parent: "The ABA center is closed for summer and now I have to provide my own childcare 😭"

Interesting.

Minnesota's Medicaid revalidation sweep just removed thousands of providers from high-risk programs as the state tightened fraud oversight.

Turns out the fastest way to identify services functioning as childcare is to watch what people complain about when the funding disappears.

openminds.com

K, she's hinting to you that your professional 'career' should involve higher education. You are only as good as your training is. You cannot possibly call yourself a 'therapist' without clinical licensure, and until then, stay in your lane and respect your elders. Temple is telling you to go back to school before you make fun of people who have chosen higher education.

Temple Grandin is one of the friendliest people you will ever talk to.

Previously, I was worried about how our conversation would go. In fact, I didn’t want to speak at all, I only wanted to listen.

Temple walked so we could run. How could *I* possibly contribute to a discussion?

Luckily, I didn’t wonder that for very long. She asked me so many questions!

I got to tell her about my work on social media, why it’s important and who it’s for.

She shared about how being exposed to a variety of experiences in adolescence lead to her ability to pursue a career.

We swapped stories about having to conform to social norms, like the importance of good hygiene, time management, and verbal inhibition.

Believe it or not, on a personal level, we don’t have much in common.

She loves the airport, I hate it.

She enjoys talking to strangers, I merely tolerate it.

She needs short bursts of exercise to regulate, I need to be mentally and physically exhausted over a period of several hours.

But on a professional level, we share a passion for providing actionable information. We both value practicality and efficiency.

And perhaps most notably, we’re both willing to go great lengths to offer our skills and abilities in service of the autism community.

Ten years ago, I could never have imagined today as a possibility.

Temple is a role model to me and I am beyond grateful for the opportunity to speak with her 🥹

Aaliyah Michelle Fortner was 23 years old.

She loved *Beauty and the Beast*. She loved going for rides. Her family says she showed affection by touching the faces of people she trusted. She was autistic, had severe intellectual disabilities, and was beginning to find new ways to communicate with the world around her.

According to the medical examiner, Aaliyah died from complications of calorie malnutrition due to inadequate nutritional intake due to caregiver neglect. The autopsy found she had lost approximately 60 pounds in six months and was less than 75% of her ideal body weight.

This is not simply a story about one caregiver. It is a story about what happens when publicly funded care operates beyond the view of families and beyond meaningful public accountability.

In this essay, I examine Aaliyah's death as a case study in transparency, surveillance, and oversight. If taxpayers fund care for profoundly vulnerable people, should that care remain largely invisible? What obligations do providers owe to families who are asked to trust systems they cannot see?

Aaliyah deserved better.

Read here:

Aaliyah Michelle Fortner was 23 years old: Could Surveillance Cameras Have Saved Her Life? she lost approximately 60 pounds over six months and weighed approximately 84 pounds at the time of her death

CALIFORNIA: Too many Self-Determination Program participants are being told that when a regional center denies a request, their only option is to file at OAH and spend months fighting over a single service. Families are exhausted. They are caring for disabled children or adults, managing crises, attending IPP meetings, answering endless requests for paperwork, and then being pushed into an administrative hearing process controlled by the same state system that funds and oversees California's developmental disability bureaucracy.

But many disputes are not really about the service. They are about process. Did the regional center ignore information discussed during IPP meetings? Did they change their explanation over time? Did they rely on unpublished rules? Did they fail to issue a Notice of Action? Did they tell a Self-Determination participant they had freedom and flexibility, then treat them as if they were still trapped in the traditional purchase-of-service system? Those are legal questions that may extend far beyond whether a single support was approved or denied.

Parents and consumers should at least learn about Superior Court remedies, including writ petitions, before assuming OAH is the only path. The Self-Determination Program funded by California Department of Developmental Services was supposed to increase autonomy, not create another layer of gatekeeping. If your dispute is really about due process, administrative misconduct, or the failure of a regional center to follow the law, it may be time to stop arguing about one service and start documenting the system itself.

Forget OAH – Sue in a Higher Court with Real Judges Many consumers assume OAH is equivalent to a traditional court. It is not. OAH is an administrative tribunal funded by the same state government that funds DDS and oversees the regional center syst…

Charlie's mother admits that one week of no-more ABA exposure has immediate relief potential. Let's keep guiding them, even if they are a hate-response type of personality. Look out for our tribe.

every worm can turn a leaf.

www.facebook.com

Piano teachers need ethical guidance for terminating lessons when an autistic student is not being given the conditions required to succeed — especially when lack of practice is being mistaken for lack of ability.

I wrote this case study from my perspective as Autistic Dr. Henny Kupferstein, a piano teacher with nearly 20 years of experience teaching autistic students worldwide.

This is expert advice on how to terminate or pause lessons without blaming the child, leading them on, or turning paid instruction into musical babysitting.

Ethical Termination – Madeline’s 6 Weeks of Piano Lessons I am Autistic Dr. Henny Kupferstein. For over a decade, I have taught piano to autistic students around the world. After publishing an evidence-based piano curriculum for autistic students, I agree…