Cure of Autistic Disorders: Mission Impossible is Possible in an Illustrated Pioneering Experience.

Abstract

Background: Autistic disorders have become increasingly known as pervasive developmental disorders since the 1980s. They have been recently called autism spectrum disorder mostly by the American Psychiatric Association. They include five chronic disorders marked by early impairment in socialization, communication and behavior. There is no curative therapy or therapies for autistic disorders and they continue to be regarded as lifelong disorders. The aim of this paper is to describe our extensive experiences with treatment of autistic disorders with emphasis on the possibility of curing these disorders with a new therapeutic approach. Marked improvement or disappearance of autistic features in these disorders has not been reported with any therapy before. Materials and methods: During the period from December, 2017 to November, 2019, 116 patients with various autistic disorders were observed at the pediatric psychiatry clinic of the Teaching Hospital of Baghdad Medical City. 84 (72.4%) patients were males and 32 (28.6%) female’s patients were females. The patients’ ages ranged from two years to 16 years. The patients were from several provinces in Iraq including Baghdad, Saladdin, Najaf, Wassit, Kerbalaand Erbil in the North of Iraq). The patients were reported previously in several publications. All the patients had very poor speech development except the patients with Asperger syndrome. Most of the patients with a diagnosis other than Asperger syndrome were not saying any word and few patients were saying few words. Most patients were treated with a new therapeutic approach which included injectable cerebrolysin as the main therapeutic component. Marked improvement or disappearance of autistic features in these disorders has not been reported with any therapy before. The patients were treated with a new approach which aimed at improving the cardinal features of autistic disorders which include impairment of social interaction which is mostly manifested by poor responsiveness to their name and infrequent engagement with others manifested by poor eye contact and infrequently looking to faces. It was not possible to follow all the patients regularly nor was it possible to document details of the treatment and responses of all patients. Results: Almost all the patients treated with the new therapeutic approach experienced some improvement and lessening of the autistic features during the follow-up period. Treatment was also associated with initiation of speech and improvement of repetitive behaviors. It was possible to document complete disappearance of the main autistic features in twenty patients. It seems that the patients who achieved complete disappearance of the main autistic features will need an intensive learning especially of speech to abolish the effect of the time when they were under the effect of autistic behavior and to push them toward a possible cure of their illness. Conclusion: In this paper, we have demonstrated the possibility of cure of autistic disorders including autism and Asperger syndrome with use of individualized courses of intramuscular cerebrolysin as the main therapy for the main autistic features (Impaired social interaction and communication dominated by the lack of response to their name and poor eye contact). Understanding, a cure of autism will not immediately abolish the cumulative effect of the condition on learning, behavior and speech development before cure.