The statistics are staggering. One in one hundred Quebec children have been diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder, a number that makes finding spaces for treatment difficult.
Early Intensive Behavioral Intervention, better known as EIBI, has been proven to help kids with the disorder at an early age. The government has approved it, even mandating that it be offered up until the age of six, but many parents are still left frustrated at long waiting lines.
The issue has become so problematic that many parents have started a petition to open up more spaces for the intervention program to give more opportunities to children who fall on the spectrum.
Lynda Kachaami-Martin is one of those parents. When her son Gabby Martin was diagnosed with the disorder at the age of three, she was desperate to get her son into the West Montreal Readaptation Centre, or CROM, in Beaconsfield for early intervention therapy.
“The idea is to take them as far as they can go and this development will affect their ability to connect with people for the rest of their lives,” said Kachaami-Martin.
Gabby, however, is not in the centre. At five years old, he has been left on a waiting list for almost two years.
“You child needs something and you cannot give it to them and you're just tortured by the fact that he's not getting the thing that he needs,” she said.
Early Intensive Behavioral Intervention is offered at three centres in Montreal, all funded by the government.
“We use principles of behaviour to increase skills to increase appropriate behaviour for these kids,” explained Amanda Fiore, a specialist in clinical activities CROM.
The program is tailored to each child's specific needs and the key is starting early, said Fiore.
“It's long term, right. If we intervene early then we can integrate them in schools – in regular schools. On so many factors, it's important,” she said.
CROM says evidence has proven that early intervention is the key to successful treatment. It not only improves the quality of life of children, but also leads to a much lower financial burden on Quebec’s health care system.
At the CROM, there is a 25-month wait to get access to this specific treatment, leaving 225 children under the age of six on the list, and a total of 500 children desperately waiting for treatment.
Parents are fed up, said Carole Mercier, head of CROM parents' committee.
“The services are considered very good here, so we draw people. We have probably an above-average number of needs in the community, because of that and traditionally we have never had enough funding,” she said.
Quebec’s Auditor General also recognized that the centre is underfunded, leading Mercier to begin an online petition to be presented to the government. The Auditor General's report and other independent studies have shown that CROM is chronically underfunded, receiving $13.6 million less annually than other centres. Parents signing the petition are asking the government for $12.2 million to address those needs.
“We would like to bring the funding up to a fair level. We're not asking for a fortune… If we do that we will be able to deal with the waiting lists,” she said.
Veronique Hivon, the ministerfor public health and youth protection, said they're working on improving access everywhere.
“I'm looking at all these issues and putting into place the best ways of organizing these services so that the most children possible can have these services,” she said.
Meantime, thanks to her family's generosity, Kachaami-Martin has managed to offer her son the treatment privately -- at a cost of $3000 per month. She is one of the more than 40 per cent of parents with ASD children who pay for treatment because the public system cannot respond to demand.
Her message to the government is clear:
“If you can't set up for the centre, (let them) to do it themselves. Give parents more of a subsidy. Do something,” she said. “You can't just leave them hanging like this.”
