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How Can We Be Happier?

Read insightful and timely articles by Dr. Ronit Molko on a wide range of behavioral health topics.

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February 27

How Can We Be Happier?

Americans today are emotionally distressed. Many are nervous about the economy, struggling to afford rent or buy a home, frustrated about the direction of the nation, feeling culturally and politically divided, socially isolated and most concerning of all, uncharacteristically unhappy. We know Americans are feeling blue because they tell us so. According to a survey …
An image of a teen looking worried while sitting against a wall, with her right hand arm on her knee, supporting her head
September 14

Addressing Student Mental Health Is Complex … And Critical

Forbes Books AuthorRonit MolkoSep 13, 2022,03:59pm EDT In a previous blog on my website written for Radicle Health, I discussed the broad mental health issues facing students today in our schools and on-campuses across the country. The focus was primarily on current response procedures, and what certain schools and states are doing to implement more nuanced support systems …
an image depicting children in a classroom, with a child raising his left arm to ask the teacher a question
August 2

Providers Working with Communities to Address Student Mental Health

Emotional wellness has become the elephant in the room in our schools today, as young people struggle like never before with their mental health. A student at Long Beach State University in California called a friend in an emotional crisis, desperate for help and threatening to harm herself. The friend knew she had to act …
Graphic that reads MYTH: Nonverbal or Nonspeaking People with Autism are Intellectually Disabled
March 10

MYTH: Nonverbal or Nonspeaking People with Autism are Intellectually Disabled

RONIT MOLKO, PH.D., BCBA-DSTRATEGIC ADVISOR, LEARN BEHAVIORAL Just because someone is nonspeaking, does not mean they’re non-thinking. Around 25 to 30 percent of children with autism spectrum disorder are minimally verbal or do not speak at all. These individuals are referred to as nonverbal or nonspeaking, but even the term nonverbal is a bit of …
Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg attending Fridays For Future (School Strike for Climate) protest in front of a huge crowd near the Colosseum
January 26

Neurodiversity: What It Means, Why It Matters

BY RONIT MOLKO, PH.D., BCBA-DSTRATEGIC ADVISOR, LEARN BEHAVIORAL If there is one enduring hallmark of the American experience, it’s the immense diversity found within our expansive borders. Most of the time, we perceive diversity via differences in skin color, language, clothing, places of worship, or even the foods people eat when gathered around the table …
man in a wheelchair rolling through a pedestrian crossing surrounded by people walking in all directions
October 1

Let’s Stop Fixing Disabilities And Start Appreciating Differences

Able-bodied people comprise the dominant culture in America; thus, our cultural understanding of “normal” is contextualized around the contours of able-bodied activities. We consider, for example, an autistic mind or a visual deficiency that enhances other senses to be a detriment. In truth, these traits are often different ways of perceiving, understanding, and interacting with …
November 10

Value-Based Healthcare

A patient desperate for pain relief opts for spinal fusion surgery, a procedure that typically costs between $80,000 and $150,000. Spinal fusion can offer benefits to healthcare patients but it has a woeful success rate often tabbed at 50%. We know that three of every seven patients who undergo the operation require further surgical intervention …
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October 8

This AI Tool For Diagnosing Autism Could Hit The Market ‘In The Second Half Of 2021’

A tool that helps pediatricians diagnose autism with artificial intelligence and smartphone video passed a key FDA test and could hit the market as soon as next summer, according to device-maker Cognoa, which recently announced its plans to submit the tool for final approval. In a trial to measure its safety and effectiveness, doctors diagnosing …
Technology, Personalized Medicine, And Autism
August 6

Technology, Personalized Medicine, And Autism

Imagine walking into your doctor’s office and being greeted not by people who invite you to wait, but by a scanner ready to gather information about your heart, kidney, lung and liver function. Scanning your body for a near-complete diagnostic work-up, the scanner forwards your results to a giant screen in the exam room where …
Healthcare Services Present and Future
July 30

Healthcare Services Present and Future

Covid-19 is understandably viewed as a crisis in the U.S., with a death toll topping 100,000 amid an economic shutdown that catapulted the nation into an instant recession. Nearly every sector of the economy has been broadsided by its effects. Rippling beneath the surface have been pockets of technological advance and investment opportunities, perhaps nowhere …
how-race-and-ethnicity-affect-diagnosis-treatment-and-support-for-autistic-children
June 30

How Race and Ethnicity Affect Diagnosis, Treatment and Support for Autistic Children and Adults

Recent events have magnified inequities in our society along racial and ethnic lines generally and particularly in areas such as education, as instruction has moved online and become more parent-dependent. As one example, a 2019 study found that one-third of black households lack home broadband service and fewer than half own a computer. This disparity …
Latin American Doctor Checking Patient Infected Of Covid-19 At H
June 30

Home Healthcare & COVID-19

Covid-19 has upended life globally, but perhaps no more than for the elderly, children and disabled individuals receiving health care services in their homes, and for the caregivers themselves. Ten million Americans rely on home health services for such disparate health needs as speech therapy, autism services, wound care and personal hygiene. For those over …