Are Online Interventions Effective for My Child with ASD? A Review of Online Interventions for Pre-Primary and Primary Aged Children with ASD during the COVID-19 Pandemic

This pandemic has been hard on us all but particularly on our children with Autism. Children in India have been in home isolation and lockdown for over 15 months. They have had no access to their schools, play areas, public spaces or outings. Children with Autism have been affected significantly as they are unable to access therapy centres and schools. We also realised that the families were under inordinate amounts of pressure adding to the complexity of the situation. At CADDRE, we were intent on continuing to provide the best care possible during this time. We quickly realised that without ongoing support and care, the gains made thus far would be lost. The uncertainty of the lockdown period also meant that unless we improvised and started providing interventions through the online platform, we would be unable to support the families and children. A review of the literature that was emerging during this time highlighted the challenges that were being faced by the Autism community; however, there was very little being highlighted in terms of changing practices to suit the current need or any information on how interventions were being provided during the pandemic. At our centre, we tried different ways of implementing academic and therapeutic strategies. We were faced with many challenges but took these as opportunities to innovate and create new practices. We have attempted to document these and put it in the form of an article. We would like to share the interdisciplinary knowledge and insights we have gained with parent communities and clinicians who work with young children with ASD (Age- 2.5 to 9 years) with the hope that during the pandemic, clinicians and families will consider alternatives to face-to-face therapies and will consider online interventions as an effective way of intervention implementation.