Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is widely known by individuals across the globe. ASD has no cure in spite of having widespread research and public awareness. According to the Stanford Medicine News Center, the demand for autism treatment is 18 times larger than the available supply of caregivers in the US. Along with this, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that there is 15 percent upsurge in the demand for autism treatment & diagnosis as compared to the previous year. Because of potential barriers such as distance, cost, and availability of experienced providers, the individuals with autism and their families are unable to receive timely diagnosis and treatment.
Inspired by their own personal experience with autism, Ron and Sharon Oberleitner established Behavior Imaging® to provide disabled people access to better care digitally. The duo has devoted their careers to aiding families and organizations to improve their accessibility to behavioral health treatment.
Back in 1996, Ron and Sharon went through an unfortunate event. Their son was diagnosed with autism and they experienced difficulties in receiving specialized care. But, there was a big drawback in the healthcare systems. Their son received his treatment late due to lack of facilities. Therefore, Ron and Sharon decided to break the aforementioned barriers and develop a unique solution that will bring families closer to the options they need for their autistic child’s development and future.
Meeting the Challenges of Early Autism Diagnosis
Initiated in 2005, Behavior Imaging® develops solutions to facilitate the observational, analytical, and collaborative needs of behavioral healthcare, and special education professionals. The company focuses on the challenges of early autism diagnosis and takes behavioral care beyond in-person assessment & treatment into a fully realized technological landscape. The services provided by Behavior Imaging® enables patients to collaborate and consult with physicians through video capture and a secure health record application that allows users to store, share, and annotate video files. In addition, the patients do not have to wait long at the diagnostic clinics. Instead, they receive the diagnosis reports as early as possible.
Connecting Healthcare Entities through Effective Applications
For the early diagnosis and better treatment, Behavior Imaging® has developed the following applications, which help in the areas of behavioral healthcare, mental health, and special education.
- Behavior Connect™: It is an online portal that enables health and education professionals and their organizations to remotely interact with clients, specialists, and other staff members while building a library of shareable assets and a continuous health record.
- Behavior Capture™: It is an app used to capture and upload video evidence from natural environments securely into the online service, Behavior Connect™ or AssessmentView™.
- NODA™ Autism Diagnosis: NODA enables clinical centers to offer a new remote autism assessment service. With NODA, clinicians observe behaviors captured by the family at home through a secure platform. A recent study has been done in which current in-person autism assessment practices are compared with the NODA smartphone-based method. This research shows that the NODA method cut the average total time for an ASD assessment in half—saving on average two months for families.
- Assessment View™: The company has developed a seamless platform for assessing student progress in special education on every level: classroom, school, district and state-wide alternate assessment.
Due to aforesaid contributions in assessing the diagnosis of autism, Behavior Imaging® has won prestigious awards from the Small Business Administration (awarded 2016 at the White House) and Google/Autism Speaks for its disruptive business model.
Enhancing Employees’ Experience
Enhancing Employees’ Experience To deliver better care facility, Behavior Imaging® needs employees who are experienced in managing individuals suffering from autism or other disabilities. To achieve this, the company pays for additional training provided to employees regularly in areas relevant to their position. In some cases, employees receive direct hands-on experience from colleagues with disabilities who perform special tasks for the company. Apart from this, Behavior Imaging® reflects a culture of “family first, Behavior Imaging second” which helps to attract and retain the right employees.
A Leading Expert Improving the Quality of Healthcare
Ron Oberleitner, the CEO and Chairman of Behavior Imaging®, has over 25 years of executive management experience within the health industry including medical devices, telemedicine, and medical imaging solutions. The Co-founder—Sharon Oberleitner works as the Vice President of Clinical and Corporate Affairs of the company. Sharon and Ron, both are leading the company to help others from their personal experience with autism and professional experience from the medical device, nonprofit, and research industries. To become a helping hand for families and individuals, the dynamic duo and their teams are creating and expanding solutions for better diagnostic, assessment, and continuity of care for a variety of behavioral and mental health challenges.
Additionally, Ron also successfully commercialized numerous innovations for the autism community, including Behavior Imaging®, TalkAutism™, and AutismCares™. He has a proven track record of bringing helpful technologies to market for improved clinical operations and treatment of various medical conditions, autism and other developmental disabilities. Similarly, Sharon has spoken at numerous national autism conferences and was felicitated with a “Top Innovator Award” for founding a new platform used throughout multiple states for assessing Special Need student progress.
In the upcoming years, Ron and Sharon are planning to integrate artificial intelligence (AI) to help clinical professionals make quicker and better-informed decisions as they assess behaviors and recommend treatments.
The Future of Healthcare Industry
Being an experienced entrepreneur, Ron believes that the healthcare market is awakening due to the benefits of capturing health data in real-time. The sharing of health data with the remote knowledgeable doctors to receive earlier diagnosis and/or treatment guidance is helping families and individuals across the globe in improving and managing their health.
