FAQ - Momentum Learning Services Early Intervention Services for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders located in Sydney, Australia

Please refer to the list of most frequently asked questions below regarding our services:

What is the process involved in starting up services?

Conduct a free 30-45min phone consult to discuss your child and potential services that might be suitable.
Arrange a time to conduct an initial assessment to determine service recommendations and design your child's program.
Recruit and/or train ABA therapists if required.
An initial team meeting to introduce and review your child's program with the therapist team, family and child.
Therapy starts.

Why are your services classified as 'home-based'?

All our services are currently provided directly in your home, child's school or relevant community setting as required. This includes assessment, team meetings and therapy sessions. Our reasons for providing a home-based rather than a centre-based service model include:

To ensure that the environment that we assess and teach in is as close as possible to the environment where those skills will actually be used by the child. This is most likely to facilitate better generalisation.
To minimise the need for families to travel great distances for appointments so that more time can be dedicated to actual intervention rather than simply commuting to and from it.
To keep down costs; the infrastructure associated with an office is a cost that is invariable passed on through service fees. Staff manage administratively from home-based offices to minimise this.

Will my child be required to do 30-40 hours of treatment per week?

The research definitely supports 30+ hours a week of ABA-based therapy for a minimum of 2 years as the most effective intensity for optimising outcomes. This does necessarily not mean that this will be recommended for your child. Reccomendations regarding the treatment intensity that is appropriate for your child will be determined by the degree of developmental delay that your child is experiencing.

How do we do the recommended intensity when our child's schedule is so full already?

Often families may be engaging in a variety of different interventions as part of the treatment plan for their child. Our general guidelines regarding involving multiple services are:

Only continue with services that are clearly making a positive difference to your child. If they are not working as they have been promoted to then cease them.
Devote more resources to the services that do work best for your child, e.g., more hours.
Make sure that every service involved with your child is willing and able to work collaboratively, share a similar philosophy and complement rather than conflict with one another.
Avoid introducing more than one service at the same time so that you can more accurately identify which services are responsible for which outcomes.

Who will be teaching my child?

We provide a Behavioural Consultant will be responsible for assessing your child initally, designing an individualised treatment program and providing clinical support to you and your therapists on an ongoing basis.

Families source Therapists with specifc training or to be trained in ABA. Therapists are responsible for working directly with your child on a day-day basis. For more information regarding therapists click here.

Depending upon availability, we can also provide Team Leaders to assist in ensuring that your program is being implemented as directed by your child's Behavioural Consultant. They provide regular practical support including overlaps for new therapists, therapy sessions and regular feedback about your child's progress to the Behavioural Consultant.

What are the assosciated costs involved?

Our organisation aims to provide the highest quality of service delivery at the most competitive costs possible. In doing so we hope that we can assist a greater number of families who may be otherwise excluded from accessing effective treatment options.

Every individual with ASD is different and as such the recommended combination of services, intensity with which they are delivered and cost will depend on several factors:

the outcomes of an initial assessment
the scope and volume of goals that you prioritise
your child's rate of acquisition through the course of treatment
The location where services are to be provided
Whether or not your child's family will be claiming for the cost of services through FaHCSIA funding++

Can I use my FaHCSIA funding for services?

Yes. All costs assosciated with accessing our Behavioural Consultants and Team Leaders are able to be claimed through the 'Helping Children with Autism' Package from Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaHCSIA).

How do we know if the intervention program is actually working?

We are extremely committed to making sure that we measure and evaluate your child's progress regularly and in a manner that provides clear evidence about the effectiveness of your child's treatment.

Some of the measures built in to our approach are:

Regular data collection during all therapy sessions.
A minimum monthly review of progress through regular team meetings.
Progress review reports every 6 months of continuous treatment.

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