on residential services and units they use complex autism and it's not an official diagnostic term. what is the difenition for it. its translated as level 3 on some things and thats not the levels is not used in the uk. and theres one it goes back to 2005 the difference for complex and essential autism ive not heard of these terms either.
what is the defenition for it and why and who uses it. is it when services use it for high care like in institution care. its not an official thing.
pbs for challenging behaviours here i don't like how they they call it that. they punish distress and name all things they say is wrong with me. it doesn't support people or help them. i don't like deficit based either because of how they treat autism this way
I have looked at the site a few times over the last year and it looks to me that it is AI driven. The website was formed out of a tech startup company.
The website promotes ABA (Applied Behavioural Analysis), which is a controversial behaviour based system that was designed to decrease autistic children’s ‘problem’ behaviours, and increase their non-typical behaviours. Although ABA is used in various parts of the world, it is condemned by many autistic people and neuro-affirming professionals. I know that they have said they are using AI to transform ABA.
Personally, I avoid the site as I don’t like how they consider autism to be a deficit. I wouldn’t like being told my autistic behaviours are a problem that need fixed and I wouldn’t want to be made to act in a way that wasn’t natural for me.
i been on that site before do you know if it's all ai written. it looks like it is all ai and the images all look ai generated. is it helpful that site it has loads of pages of detailed explanations but if it's ai how much is different
what is the defenition for it
https://neurolaunch.com/complex-autism/
Complex autism, also known as autism plus or autism with complex needs, is a term used to describe individuals on the autism spectrum who face additional challenges beyond the core features of autism spectrum disorder
I would imagine complex means there are multiple areas where support is needed. So there is no simple solution, adaptation or change that solves or reduces the problem. There are a number of probably interlinked areas each requiring something. Possibly different people are needed for different items, requiring more coordination.
Essential could mean essential needs, like eating. Or it could refer to issues that are related to autism directly, as opposed to some other co-occurring condition.
I think maybe someone might have joined a couple of terms together as a sort of abbreviation.
If someone is described as having complex needs; it usually is describing that the person has been diagnosed with one or more: illness, disability or sensory impairment and needs a lot of additional support on a daily basis, and the are described as having "complex needs". The person's complex needs msy have been part of that person's life since they were born, or as a result of an illness, or due to having experienced an injury.
Depending upon how, when and where a person's Autism Assessment was carried out and the person then received their Autism diagnosis - the language used to then help the Autistic person (and those other people who support, educate and care for the Autistic person) better understand how their personal experience of Autism affects their daily life and how much and what type of support and help the person regularly needs can vary s bit.
For example, somebody who has high support needs where other people might need to help them with day to day things a lot of the time used to sometimes have the description Level 3 mentioned on their diagnosis report feedback information.
These days, in the UK, not all assessment centres write things in their diagnosis reports for Autistic people in exactly the same way as another centre, nor exactly the same way as an Autism assessor in the UK maybe even 10 years ago, or 20 years ago - might have written the diagnostic description for an Autistic person.
The assessment criteria are updated over time and the language use acceptable in previous years may not match what is used today.
Increasingly, people in the Autistic community are also educating healthcare and social care professionals about an individual person's language preferences about how they are spoken to and written to as well.
For instance, I might prefer it when people describe me as "an Autistic person", whereas, another Neurodivergent person might be happy if they are described as "having Autism".
Words and phrases have changed over the years, the diagnostic criteria get updated every so often, different countries may use different terms, Autistic people may express identity and language use preferences.
An Autistic person may gain new / receive updated other diagnosis information about their mind and body and strengths / weaknesses in coping with life over the years too - all of which combines to form a detailed and personal summary of the particular type of additional: awareness, understanding, care and support needs they require in their life now to thrive.
UK law and NHS guidelines also either get updated, or new rules are introduced now and then about how to support and safeguard Autistic people, people with mental health conditions and those people other physical, or hidden disabilities too. These legal or medical guidance changes can also mean changes to what is noted on an Autistic persons records and letters.
Also these days, in the UK, some assessment centres do not concentrate as much as they used to do so on descriptions like Level 3.
Instead, people like healthcare professionals; now may concentrate more on understanding and describing which things in the life of an Autistic person can that person do all by themself, with which things might they need daily support and help, and what less frequent situations in the life of the Autistic person might family members, or carers, or administrative staff, or medical staff, or other service providers need to know and remember: the particular Autistic person might do their best with an understanding and supportive person bring a bit more helpful than another person might need in the same situation.
The other types of things which might also need to be considered:
- what living environment would be best.
- what communication style and support should be available (maybe an Easy Read document or form would be helpful).
- is the person Autistic, or might they be Neurodivergent in another way too (such as perhaps ADHD or dyslexia - and there are other ways).
- does the Autistic person have a learning disability and need a less time pressured and more detailed information situation to best learn about new information and to support for their decision-making.
- do people need to understand the Autistic person has a physical disability (some disabilities people might notice, like being a wheelchair user, but other disabilities might be less obvious when you meet the Autistic person - such as a hearing issue).
- to care for and best support the autistic person safely and with dignity; it might be important to also know if they also have a mental health condition (maybe anxiety, depression, they have experienced trauma or have a diagnosis of a type of personality disorder - and there are many more mental health, or personality, or emotional things to understand for some people).
- is it possible for the person's behaviour to be affected by one one or more of their medications in some situations.
- does the person experience issues with their sensory perception like touch or sound or lighting.
- are their things to understand about the person when eating food.
- is the person someone who could be upset by changes of plan, or their routine, or frightened by an unexpected noise.
- does the person have other physical, or medical conditions which can affect their daily life, or mean they need more medical care (perhaps they are diabetic, or epileptic, or allergic to something).
- are there particular things (which might not be obvious to other people) which can really make the Autistic person feel very upset, or angry, or frightened - if the situation is not explained properly to the person.
- does the person have a support network of relatives, ot friends to help out if necessary.
- does the Autistic person have all these sort of things written down in a health passport, or a hospital passport, or a Neurodivergent passport, or an EHCP (Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan).
If there were several of the above things (an addition to Autism) for the person where a GP, Doctor or Assessor would diagnose "yes" - thst would make it more likely that their medical records, reports, forms, or letters might mention "complex needs".
Everyone's medical health is a combination of their physical health and their mental health.
For Neurodivergent people there might be extra support needed because they are Autistic or something else too.
If people also live their life with one or more type of learning disability there might be other types of support needs to consider too.
The well known phrase: "when you have met an Autistic person; you have only met one Autistic person" comes to my mind - reminding everyone that we are a community of Autistic people - each one of us is an individual person whose experience of our Autism may not be exactly the same as that of another Autistic person.
You are unique in as much as I am unique.
Therefore, although we both are Autistic people (we each of us might not only be Autistic): how we each experience life and Autism, the nature of support from which we each might benefit, plus the types of reasonable adjustments we each might need - could be quite different from one another.
I sometimes feel the Autism-related: training, awareness, understanding, acceptance, support and choice / consistency of language use of those involved in loving us, caring for us and supporting us ...still needs really quite a lot more improvement.
(It is a good job that we have our community here - so that we can jointly keep pushing for progress in improving support of all Autistic people).
