Raising a child diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder can be difficult for any family.

It can be even more challenging when there’s language barriers.

“Research is telling us that Latinos are diagnosed later than white or African American people,” UTRGV professor Dr. Cecilia Montiel-Nava said.

Montiel-Nava is the director of the UTRGV Behavior and Child Development Lab — BECHILDLAB — which has been focusing on autism research since it opened in 2019.

“Here in the Valley, we have close to no services for the general Latino population,” Montiel-Nava said. “Our goal in this lab is to study what are the factors impacting ethnic health disparities."

To help bridge that gap in services, BECHILDLAB launched the first Spanish-speaking caregiver skills training program in the U.S.

It’s a program developed by the World Health Organization, with help from Autism Speaks. 

The facilitators of the program are UTRGV students who to teach families how to use everyday activities to improve their children's social communication skills and behavior.

“It doesn't matter your child's development stage, you're going to get benefits from the program,” Montiel-Nava said. “One of the parents told us ‘we found community.’ And for us that pays the bills. Just hearing that is so powerful."

There are currently 18 families in the program. 

The program is free, and no diagnosis is necessary, in an effort to make it accessible to families in the Valley.

The program is nine sessions long, and it's for families with children ages 2 through 9.

More information is available online. You can also call the BECHILD lab at 956-665-8217.