Structured exercise intervention program for preschool autistic children was launched

Childhood autism has become a global public health concern, and its incidence has remained high for a long time. According to the latest data from the United States, 1 in 44 children has autism. At present, the traditional intervention therapy for autism mainly includes rehabilitation therapy such as applied behavior analysis therapy and early intervention Denver model, as well as drug therapy. However, most of the efficacy lacks systematic evidence-based medical evidence, and there is no optimal treatment plan. Drug therapy, on the other hand, does not alter the course of autism or lacks specific drugs to treat core symptoms.

As a non-drug treatment method, children's exercise intervention refers to the teaching purpose according to the child's development level, and there is an adult guidance and organization of the exercise mode, and the sports types generally include basketball, football, dance and swimming. Among them, children's basketball is a form of children's sports formed according to the age characteristics and physical development level of young children, combined with the basic theories and technologies of basketball.

Recently, Zhang Ting, a researcher at the Beijing Key Laboratory of Child Developmental Nutrition Omics of the Capital Institute of Pediatrics, took the lead in launching a study on "the improvement effect of structured exercise intervention on multi-dimensional growth and development indicators of preschool autism in preschool children and the possible mechanism of related disease improvement". Through the development of personalized early childhood basketball sports training courses for preschool autistic children, and the training of qualified autism rehabilitation engineers as early childhood basketball sports trainers, this project aims to intervene and systematically evaluate the improvement goals of multi-dimensional healthy development indicators such as social ability, physical development, motor ability and sleep in children with autism as the special theme of structured exercise intervention with the theme of early childhood basketball, and explore the possible mechanisms of related disease improvement.

The study is a key special research content of the national key research and development program "Developmental Programming and Its Metabolic Regulation", and the project lasts for 3 years. During the formulation of the project programme, a number of experts from the fields of pediatrics, child health, early childhood sports and children's mental health gave strong support and positive recognition to the project work. Through the training and guidance of children's basketball, we will promote the positive intervention model of children with autism, which has a safe and reasonable theoretical basis for scientific and technological innovation in China. The lead unit of the project is the Capital Pediatric Research Institute, the technical cooperation unit is the Zhejiang Provincial Early Childhood Sports Association, and the project has also received guidance from the National Maternal and Child Health Research Association and strong support from the Beijing Dayu Child Development Center to escort the smooth implementation of the project. (Guangming Daily all-media reporter Yang Shu)