It’s Not Autism
A message from Dr. Michael J. Goldberg
During my training in medical school and pediatrics during the 1970s, we were taught that there was no such thing as an epidemic of a genetic disorder, that there were not mysterious developmental disorders where a child develops normally for the first 1 ½ to 2 years and then regresses without a given reason or cause—like we are seeing with autism today. There also was no such thing as a “childhood disintegrative disorder.” We were taught that epidemics could only be the result of a disease process. As a physician, I am shocked that our medical and research world would overlook these simple facts and key medical / scientific logic and training.
For the last twenty years, I have treated patients who were diagnosed with Autism, PDD, ADD, ADHD, and other related disorders by using the Goldberg Approach™, and as a result, many have dramatically improved or eventually have had symptoms disappear. Because it is incorrectly assumed that the basis for autism is developmental, parents are missing out on a vital component of treatment for their children. We must recognize that these children have multiple “autistic” symptoms, but it is time to focus on and treat the real underlying disease they have.
Sadly, because there is so little support or advice from the Pediatric medical world, parents who are desperate to help their children often have embarked on expensive therapies on their own, which in many cases can be harmful to their children. At this point we must ask ourselves why the medical establishment persists in standing by powerless while millions of children continue to receive this diagnosis, and parents endure the heartbreak of seeing their child isolated from the world and given no hope—all because we are mistakenly calling this epidemic “Autism”? Why is it that we as physicians are ignoring that what we refer to as the “Autism Spectrum” is often accompanied by a various range of food intolerances/allergies, viral markers, encephalopathy-like symptoms, frequent ear infections, GI issues, eczema or hives, sensory and auditory processing difficulties, and abnormalities with fine and gross motor skills?
Although I have had many patients recover, there are many children who still are not reaching their full potential because the degree of impairment from this complex immune / complex viral disorder is difficult to treat fully. We must develop and utilize stronger, safe, effective, and potentially healthy immune modulating medicines, while selectively targeting and using existing agents that can help with this disorder / disease now. Children with this mistaken label of “Autism” and others with related disorders can be treated medically. Children with NIDS, and their parents, do have hope for a much brighter future—if we take action now.