Effectiveness of Telehealth Direct Therapy for Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder

The field of applied behavior analysis (ABA) has utilized telehealth for clinical supervision and caregiver guidance with research supporting the use of both modalities. Research demonstrating effectiveness is crucial, as behavior analysts must ensure the services they provide are effective in order to be ethical. With the increased need for patients to access more services via telehealth, due to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the current study evaluated the efficacy of telehealth direct therapy to teach new skills to individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This study examined the utility of natural environment teaching and discrete trial training strategies provided over a videoconferencing platform to teach new skills directly to seven individuals with varying ASD severity levels. The targeted skills were taught solely through telehealth direct therapy with varying levels of caregiver support across participants and included skills in the language, adaptive, and social domains. In a multiple baseline design, all seven participants demonstrated mastery and maintenance for all targets; in addition, generalization to family members was assessed for some targets. The evidence suggests that telehealth is a modality that is effective and can be considered for all patients when assessing the appropriate location of treatment.