Plano mom develops iPad app for tracking autism

Karen Carmeli's son, Yair, was diagnosed with autism when he was 2 years old.

Every day since then for the past seven years, the Plano mom has accumulated mounds of paperwork from doctor's, therapists, insurance companies, school teachers and babysitters.

It didn't take long for her to realize she needed more than just a file cabinet to organize it all, while also keeping up with life in general.

"At some point in his life I think he had to take 10 different supplements a day, three to four in the morning, two to three after lunch in the afternoon, and a few in the evening, and some of those where only twice a week," Carmelli said. "How do you keep up with that?"

So Carmeli, who works at a Richardson-based IT company, spent six months developing an app which Apple approved on March 15.

"My Autism Day" keeps track of everything in 9-year-old Yair's life. Whether it's his diet, notes from the doctor, progress reports from school or personal goals like maintaining eye focus, Carmelli puts all of this information into the app. The interactive database gives her a way to see what's working and what might need to be scrapped in terms of Yair's progress and goals.

"Parents with autistic kids can understand the frustration when you're not sure if what you're doing is correct," Carmeli said. "With this, parents will be able to look back and check notes from yesterday, a week ago or a month ago. If you see a positive change, you might notice what caused it. I just felt like this was something I needed to do for me and for Yair."

Having never developed an iPad app before, Carmelli went to a bookstore and purchased a book to learn about it. After a while, the project grew into what parents of special needs children can use.

"Sometimes, it seems that all the work isn't paying off, but then you get moments when you realize everything you're doing is worth it," she said.

One helpful feature of "My Autism Day" is the ability to chart a child's progress in a number of different categories based on the goals that are set. Activities and notes can also be pulled to show a bird's eye view of how the child's past few days or weeks have been, in order to pinpoint upswings or downturns in the child's mood or behavior. This feature has proven to be effective in enhancing communication between Carmelli and the other individuals involved in the Andrews Elementary student's day-to-day life.

Between running from one therapist to another, cooking the right food, battling the insurance companies and working full time, she said she wanted to create something that would be all-inclusive, but that would enable others use it on the fly and fast.

"I never remember things like what he ate, and diet is always very important when you're dealing with autistic children," Carmelli said. "There's a lot of info out there you need to track, so instead of trying to remember everything by heart, it helps to have one tool where you can save it all."

Another challenge Carmelli had was communicating with the babysitter, who picks Yair up after school two to three times a week. Because Carmelli doesn't see her until she has to leave, and is at work before the babysitter picks him up, it became difficult to find the time to discuss activities and changes in the past few days.

"I can [note on the app] there was a new motivation item that really helps him to focus on or a new activity that he likes," Carmelli said. "She can pick up the iPad once they get home and see what I have done in the last few days or if there any changes in the diets or new goals I added. And vice versa."

The easy-to-navigate app also allows parents to include contact information by syncing up with the address books from the user's other Apple devices.

"As a parent struggling with this, I know that anything that will help is good," Carmelli said. "Anything that will make your life just a little bit easier -- I'm not here to cure this, I'm a mom just like everyone else. But sometimes even little things help a lot."

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