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Casandra Oldham, Director of Autism Programs at the Thought Leadership & Innovation Foundation (TLI), shares her experiences as a mother of two children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), Gareth, currently 20, and Korlan, currently 18.

In this monthly Q&A series, Casandra reflects on the evolving challenges of raising children with ASD, discussing how her goals and approaches have changed as her sons have grown. She also sheds light on broader societal and systemic obstacles affecting families like hers.

Casandra is open to receiving questions and concerns of parents who are struggling with similar issues, especially as youngsters with autism age into adulthood. TLI also invites readers to submit topics they would like to see covered throughout this blog series.   

With the launch of the Autism Knowledge Gateway (AKG), parents, physicians, researchers and scientists can access a centralized hub consolidating over 40,000 peer-reviewed research articles on autism-related medical care.

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Casandra Oldham, Director, Autism Programs, Thought Leadership & Innovation Foundation (TLI), shares her experiences as a mother of two children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), Gareth currently age 20 and Korlan currently age 18.   

In this monthly Q&A series, Casandra discusses the emotional and practical aspects of sharing her sons’ diagnoses with family, friends and her broader support network.

Casandra is open to receiving questions and concerns of parents who are struggling with similar issues, especially as youngsters with autism age into adulthood. TLI also invites readers to reach out with topics they would like to see covered on this blog series.  

With the launch of the Autism Knowledge Gateway (AKG), parents, physicians, researchers and scientists can access a centralized hub consolidating thousands of peer-reviewed research articles on autism-related medical care.

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The New York Times recently published an opinion piece, “The Robot Doctor Will See You Now,” with a compelling perspective on how the combined “abilities of doctors and A.I. would be the best of both worlds, leading to more accurate diagnoses and more efficient care.” The article’s authors, Pranav Rajpurkar and Eric J. Topol, then share a series of studies that begin to paint a picture of what an effective AI-physician partnership could look like -- with AI doing the heavy lifting on reviewing, assessing and prioritizing information relative to a patient’s case, and physicians leveraging AI’s output to do what they do best – interacting with patients, making decisions and treating.

 

For those of us dedicated to improving the healthcare outcomes for autistic patients, it is hard to imagine a better use case for the power of AI to improve health outcomes than the complex and often chaotic world of treating the many comorbidities that autistic patients live with. TLI launched The Autism Knowledge Gateway (AKG) as a first step towards addressing these complex needs, but the vision set out by Rajpurkar and Topol is a reminder of AI’s ever-changing promise and what we need to do on the way to achieving its real benefits.

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At the Thought Leadership & Innovation Foundation (TLI), we are proud to join the American Macular Degeneration Foundation (AMDF) in raising awareness of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) through Access in Sight! AMD Advocacy and Action Week. Taking place during the last week of February, this important initiative is part of Low Vision Awareness Month, which focuses on educating the public about vision health and empowering individuals to take charge of their well-being.

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