Wave and licensees also highlight a document from 2022 by a licensed clinic technician in Australia who is also a PhD candidate at the University of Sunshine Coast in Australia.
Data from 28 patients at two MERT clinics in Australia whose brains showed “significant improvement” in their individual alpha frequency waves after treatment are analyzed.
Although some previous research has found correlations between atypical alpha wave frequencies and autism diagnoses, six scientists told The Times that there is not yet enough evidence to understand how changes in alpha waves affect autistic traits, or any scientific consensus on whether “improving” this pattern of brain activity has any significant effect on autistic behaviors.
The report is a retrospective chart review that examines existing data from patients' medical records and is often used to identify interesting findings that merit further study.
By design, it does not include a control group, which is what allows researchers to identify whether the changes they observe are related to the variable they are studying. Its authors noted in the article that the findings are preliminary and require further study.
“Because this was not a controlled trial or study, [the cause of the changes] “It could have been anything, including the placebo effect, any additional therapy the children were receiving, etc.,” said Lindsay Oberman, director of the Neurostimulation Research Program at the National Institute of Mental Health.
Medical research follows a hierarchy of evidence. At the base are anecdotes and observations: valid data points that alone are not sufficient to draw general conclusions.
Above these are observational studies, which systematically collect and analyse pre-existing data. And at the top are randomised controlled trials, which are designed to remove as much bias from the experiment as possible and ensure that whatever is being studied is responsible for any observed changes.
“Families need to know that there is a gold standard for studies: To make sure something works to help people with autism, you need to have what’s called a randomized controlled trial,” said Alycia Halladay, chief scientific officer of Autism Science Foundation.
