AMA Journal of Ethics^®

Ari Ne’eman joins Ethics Talk to discuss his article, When Disability is Defined by Behavior, Outcome Measures Should Not promote “Passing”.

Defining typical appearance as a goal of health service provision is harmful and unnecessary for traits that are stigmatized but neither harmful nor distressing.

People with autism have a right to access “autism-friendly” theatrical performances. Theater-based treatment programs can help remove stigma and cultivate participants’ reciprocal social communication skills.

Physicians should provide women considering abortion after Down syndrome screening with unbiased information and not attempt to influence their decision.

The harms of communicating autism risk can be avoided by helping families to understand risk and to distinguish between poor and good sources of scientific information, which should take families’ interests into account.

Kevin Hosseini’s painting of his tutor’s dog, Bella.

In treating children with autism, physicians should focus on involving parents in a shared decision making partnership and seeking safe, evidence-based, and medically and cost-effective treatments.

There is evidence that some complementary and alternative treatments improve physiological abnormalities in autism and thus hold promise for improving symptoms.

In treating children with autism, physicians should reframe the common dynamic in which the family wants medication that the doctor is withholding to focus instead on the family’s and physician’s share goal—the patient’s well-being.

A judicious approach to autism would be to replace a “disability” or “illness” paradigm with a “diversity” perspective that takes into account both strengths and weaknesses and the idea that variation can be positive in and of itself.