FSU Autism grant

http://www.tallahassee.com/story/life/wellness/2017/10/23/fsu-leads-network-help-families-respond-autism/788480001/

Florida State University researchers have been awarded a five-year, $10.2 million Autism Centers of Excellence network grant to test a two-part home intervention designed to bridge the gap between diagnosis and treatment.

Their plan is to coach families and empower them with earlier and widespread access to cost-efficient information, education and support.

“We are honored to receive this grant from the National Institutes of Health,” said FSU College of Medicine Distinguished Research Professor Amy Wetherby, director of FSU’s Autism Institute and the ACTION Network’s lead principal investigator. “It allows us to collaborate with universities across the country and to develop and train a new workforce of individuals in the community who specialize in helping families understand autism. Our goal is to catch autism early and get underserved children ready for regular kindergarten.”

This is the second ACE project for the Autism Institute. FSU also is a partner in a recently renewed ACE center grant that the National Institutes of Health awarded to Emory University. The FSU team is working on one project to provide interventions — as early as six to 12 months — to teach parents to support their child’s early development.

Additional co-investigators on this project include Heather Flynn, associate professor and vice chair for research, College of Medicine; and Elizabeth Slate, the Duncan McLean and Pearl Levine Fairweather Professor, Department of Statistics.