The Drexel University College of Medicine Autism Consortium is a multidisciplinary program dedicated to understanding the neurobiological deficits underlying autism as they relate to early predictors of the disorder and to developing improved, novel options for diagnosis and treatment. Based in the College of Medicine, the Consortium leverages the considerable strengths and resources of the Departments of Psychiatry, Pediatrics, Pharmacology & Physiology, and Biochemistry & Molecular Biology in research and clinical care. From this effort, a powerful collaboration emerges to translate fundamental scientific discoveries into improved lives for our autistic patients and their families.
The Drexel Autism Center in the Department of Psychiatry provides services to affected children and their families, and conducts treatment studies funded by the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institute of Mental Health.
The Department of Pediatrics at St. Christopher's Hospital for Children has a long history of service to the autism community by providing excellent assessment, treatment and referral services to children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and their families.
Promising research programs are examining processes at the cellular, neurophysiological, and behavioral levels. One goal is to understand how pharmacological agents operate at the mechanistic level to ameliorate symptoms of autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Consortium researchers work from the scientific hypothesis that certain agents can remediate abnormalities in brain synchronization, neuronal oscillation, and stimulus processing that occur in children, as well as the impairments in language acquisition and emotion that characterize children with ASD. The ultimate aim is to develop more effective targets for the pharmacological treatment of ASD.
As an outgrowth of this research, the Consortium is developing novel, physiologically based technology that will lead to more precise diagnoses of children with ASD. The result will be more personalized and effective clinical care for each patient.
The integration of the efforts of our faculty across these disciplines, therefore, will enable us to expand and improve the clinical options for children with autism, and to develop the programs that will train a new generation of clinicians and basic scientists in the study and treatment of these disorders.
The Drexel University College of Medicine Autism Consortium is collaborating with other autism-focused initiatives under way at Drexel University.
Drexel University College of Medicine Autism Consortium Members
Richard P. Malone, M.D., Co-Director
Professor, Department of Psychiatry
Director, Drexel Autism Center
John A. Harvey, Ph.D., Co-Director
Professor and Chair, Department of Pharmacology & Physiology
John Welsh, Ph.D.
Professor, Department of Pharmacology & Physiology
Mary Anne Delaney, M.D.
Professor, Vice Chair and Division Director for Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry
Medical Director for Clinical Programs, Drexel Autism Center
Thad Wilson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Department of Pharmacology & Physiology
Keith Vosseller, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Department of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Scott Bunce, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Department of Psychiatry
Susan B. Hyman, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Department of Psychiatry
Maureen A. Fee, M.D., J.D.
Associate Professor, Department of Pediatrics
Section Chief, Developmental Pediatrics, St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children
H. Huntley Hardison, M.D.
Assistant Professor, Departments of Pediatrics and Neurology
Attending Neurologist, St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children
Agustin Legido, M.D., Ph.D., MBA
Professor, Departments of Pediatrics and Neurology
Section Chief, Pediatric Neurology, St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children
Jennifer Morrissette, Ph.D., FACMG
Assistant Professor, Departments of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine and Pediatrics
Director, Clinical Cytogenetics and Molecular Genetic Diagnosis, St. Christopher's Hospital for Children
Beth Parrish, M.D.
Assistant Professor, Department of Pediatrics
Medical Staff, St. Christopher's Hospital for Children
Universitywide Initiative on Autism
The faculty of several schools and colleges of Drexel University have significant scholarly accomplishments in research activities related to ASD. This expertise is prominent in epidemiology and related areas of public health; in the biological, behavioral and social sciences; and in engineering, especially biomedical engineering. Craig Newschaffer, Ph.D., professor and chair of the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics in the School of Public Health, has been collaborating extensively with faculty in the Drexel University College of Medicine Autism Consortium. Dr. Newschaffer is a renowned expert on the epidemiology of ASD, who joined the university after first establishing his prominence in the field at Johns Hopkins University. His acknowledged and increasing scientific impact on the epidemiology of ASD has led to invitations to speak to the Congressional Caucus on Autism Research and Education and on the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Project of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. The interaction of Dr. Newschaffer in the School of Public Health with faculty in the College of Medicine is one important model for collaboration among our academic units as an initiative on ASD coalesces across the University. |