This amazing project will allow our organization to retain a pediatrician 1. to expand access to culturally competent high-quality pediatric screening, diagnosis and treatment to children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and related conditions, residing in Prince George's County, Maryland and 2. to enhance the capacity of local providers to deliver competent evidence-based care to this vulnerable population. The requested funds will allow us to serve 1000 children/youth with autism annually.
This project is needed for two reasons. Firstly, due to the lack of pediatric providers with specific training in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) screening, diagnosis, care and treatment, many of the known pediatric cases of ASD residing in Prince George's County have to seek diagnostic and primary care out-of-county. The literature indicates that children with or at risk for ASD are best managed by primary care practitioners with specialized training in ASD care and treatment in their community.
One World Pediatrics will expand access to quality healthcare for children and youth with autism and developmental differences by pro-actively hiring a highly qualified board-certified pediatrician to increase the capacity of the current sole diagnostician and to serve as a primary care provider; thereby achieving the project's first aim of increasing access to quality care for children with ASD and related disorders. Our new pediatrician will also expand the capacity of our Physician Outreach.
Our new pediatrician will sustainably increase our capacity to provide approximately 120 more monthly medical visits which will focus on holistic primary care services and assist with current screening and autism diagnostic services. Along with delivering developmental screens and pediatric primary care, our provider will also spend time weekly conducting outreach to 100 community providers annually, enhancing the knowledge of screening, diagnosis, care and treatment of at risk children/ youth.
This project has provided additional documentation in a DOCX file (projdoc.docx).
