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Health Services Utilization of Autistic Youth: Are Therapeutic Services Associated with Reduced Acute Psychiatric Care?

SIEFL Core ⟩ DREAmS Lab ⟩

Autistic youth have high utilization of acute psychiatric healthcare, including psychiatric hospitalizations and using the emergency department for psychiatric reasons, which may indicate that they do not receive sufficient lower-level health services. Community-based therapeutic services like occupational, behavioral, speech, and physical therapy may be beneficial for autistic youth by reducing their need for acute psychiatric care. This study uses the OneFlorida Data Trust, a large Florida database of health records for over half of Florida’s large and diverse population. The purpose of this study is to investigate associations between therapeutic and acute psychiatric service utilization among autistic youth in Florida.

Funding

Type	Source	Number	Amount
Private	American Occupational Therapy Association	AOTFHSR20	$99,998

USC Chan Division of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy
1540 Alcazar Street, CHP 133, Los Angeles, CA 90089-9003

ACOTE accreditation | NBCOT certification

The USC entry-level master’s degree program (cost of attendance) is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Occupational Therapy Education® (ACOTE®) of the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA). The USC entry-level doctorate in occupational therapy (OTD) degree program (cost of attendance) is accredited by ACOTE®. View our program’s ACOTE® standards public data. ACOTE® c/o the American Occupational Therapy Association, Inc.®, 7501 Wisconsin Avenue, Suite 510E, Bethesda, MD 20814, (301) 652-AOTA, www.acoteonline.org.

Professional program graduates are eligible to apply for the national certification examination administered by the National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy, Inc.® (NBCOT®), nbcot.org. All states require licensure to practice; a felony conviction may affect a graduate’s ability to sit for the NBCOT® OTR certification examination or attain state licensure. Program results from the NBCOT® can be found online at www.nbcot.org/Educators-Folder/SchoolPerformance.