NAMASTE

Overview

NAMASTE (Neurodevelopment and AutisM in South ASia Treatment and Evidence) aims to develop, implement, and evaluate a novel non-specialist delivered community-based pathway to support early detection and care for young children with neurodevelopmental disabilities (NDDs) in South Asia, with a focus on autism.

NAMASTE uses the 'Social Attention and Communication Surveillance' tool, developed by La Trobe University in Australia, to screen all children for autism and connect families to two interventions:

• PASS Plus for children who screen positive for autism risk and

• the group-based Caregiver Skills Training (WHO-CST) for families whose children have other neurodevelopmental difficulties.

Rationale

South Asia has limited services to support early detection and care for young children with NDDs, and the scarcity of the specialist providers is an additional burden. NAMASTE aims to address these challenges through a set of innovations:

1. Non-Specialist Workforce: Training relevant community-based workers to screen children and provide intervention

2. Early Detection and Intervention: Developing a system of universal community-based screening of children and linking it with intervention pathways

3. Digitisation: Digitizing the PASS Plus intervention for remote learning and developing a mobile app to support its delivery

4. Community Engagement: Co-creating context-specific community awareness campaigns to support early recognition of development delays and engagement with community-based services

5. Monitoring and Evaluation: Evaluating the cost-effectiveness of this pathway in four different health systems to inform public policy

6. Capacity Building: Building capacities in the field of neurodevelopmental disabilities

Partners/ Collaborators

• Autism Care Nepal Society

• Sri Lanka College of Paediatricians

• University of Manchester; King’s College, London, UK

• Harvard Medical School, Boston, US

• La Trobe University, Victoria, Australia

• University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan, Italy

• WHO Department of Mental Health and Substance Use, Geneva, Switzerland

• Dimagi

• Quicksand, Delhi, India

• Ummeed Child Development Center, Mumbai, Maharashtra

• Autism Speaks, New York, US