Why is there a shortage of services for adults?

In my first blog, "Why Care About Autism" I wrote about the impact of autism on our society,  In that I highlighted the personal, social and economic impact of not providing appropriate services to this population. But finding appropriate services can be a challenge.  Just Google autism therapies and you will see a plethora of results relating to children including ABA therapy, family therapy, sensory therapies and so on.  Therapies for adults are difficult to find and frankly difficult to deliver, but not impossible to achieve.

In reality, we're making it more difficult than necessary.  According to the research paper, The Current State of Services for Adults with Autism,"...the potential of individuals with ASD to become employed and engaged adults is limited more by the failure of the systems charged with supporting them than by the challenges associated with being on the spectrum."

Services for adults are historically designed for individuals with different abilities than those with autism. In fact, often when an adult with autism is presented with options for services to help them with community integration, many are weary from being placed in environments or being exposed to services that do not address their needs.  According to Dr. Michael Murray, director of the division of autism services within the department of psychiatry at Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, "The adult system of services is completely unprepared to meet their needs."  I learned this as well through the comments I hear in the support groups I attend, from the vocational rehabilitation counselors I encounter who serve adults with autism, and from individuals themselves seeking assistance in their quest to become gainfully employed and live independently.

Funding for these services has its limits too.  Having an infrastructure where services are not structured for adults with ASD notwithstanding, in some states and for some providers, individuals with high functioning ASD simply do not qualify for services.  And when an individual does qualify for services, often those services are time limited and are void of the targets required for sustainable success.

So we have an infrastructure that is trying to prepare to address the many individuals aging into adulthood that require services.  Interestingly there are models in existence that can help and the good news is the cost to deliver them is much less than the cost of an entire segment of the population on Social Security Disability Insurance.  But infrastructures are slow to move and success requires  adjustments on multiple fronts.

To begin to serve adults with autism, several forces must align.

1. The existing social services infrastructure has to make room for change.  While not easy, opening up channels to allow for evolving service models that concentrate on individualized service will help everyone.  
2. Federal, state, and local entities should make it easy for new service providers with expertise to flourish and help shape a new form of service. This will help the existing service providers as well.  
3. Businesses need to understand the benefits of diversity of thought that accelerate their outcomes and achieve differentiation in their respective markets.  Allowing such diversity may seem difficult but in reality, it is more difficult to fertilize staff with general skills, than it is to harness the power of difference with staff that has a specific aptitude.  From Rudy Simone and Temple Grandin, authors of Asperger's on the Job, "...those with Asperger's possess some extremely useful, important, creative and marketable skills that employers are missing out on."  

Next blog: The fundamentals: courage and honesty