Arthur Krigsman

Arthur Krigsman, MD, is a pediatrician and gastroenterologist and the clinical director of the Thoughtful House Center for Children. Krigsman specializes in the evaluation and treatment of gastrointestinal pathology common in children with autism spectrum disorders, and has detailed the symptomatology and endoscopic/histopathologic character of what he calls autistic enterocolitis disease - although no such condition is recognised in medical literature. He has presented his findings at many scientific and lay meetings in the United States and Canada, and has testified about aspects of an apparent "autism epidemic" before the U.S. House Committee on Government Reform. There have been reports in the popular press that his current research, wherein 70 of the 82 children tested thus far are said to have tested positive for measles virus in their intestinal lining, supports the findings of his associate Andrew Wakefield, the United Kingdom gastroenterologist who first alleged that the MMR vaccine might be causing autism.[1] However, in evidence in federal court [2],Dr Krigsman indicated that the work was not complete. It has not been published in the medical literature.

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Education and early career

In 1989, Krigsman earned his MD at the State University of New York at Brooklyn. In 1992, he completed his pediatric residency at SUNY Brooklyn's Kings County Medical Center. Krigsman then had two practices, one in general pediatrics and one in pediatric gastroenterology, and was the director of the pediatric GI program at Beth Israel Medical Center in Manhattan.

Former appointment

In 2000, Krigsman accepted a position at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, where he did all their consulting for several years. There, he cared for patients with common gastroenterology problems such as inflammatory bowel disease, recurrent abdominal pain, constipation, failure to thrive, etc. Krigsman resigned from Lenox Hill in December 2004, after a lawsuit following official investigations [3]. His research was also subjected to review by the Department of Health and Human Services Office for Human Research Protections [4].

Autism research

At Lenox Hill, Krigsman found what he said was the same pathology first described in 1988 by Dr. Wakefield in a number of his own patients. "Actually, it was a number of different pathologists at our hospital that were reading the results, and they all had the same findings," according to Krigsman.[5] Krigsman's treatment of children with autistic disorders has led him to conclude that the majority have gastrointestinal symptoms. Upon examination of these patients, he says he has found "a pattern of diffuse lymphonodular hyperplasia and multifocual non-specific acute and chronic enterocolitis," throughout the entire gastrointestinal tract.[6]

In testimony before a US Congressional committee, Krigsman reviewed his research findings on a series of 43 children diagnosed with autistic disorders who were afflicted by chronic gastrointestinal symptoms. He stated that the majority were found to have inflammation of the colon and terminal ileum, while 90% had lymphonodular hyperplasia of the terminal ileum. The findings, he reported, were consistent from patient to patient.[7] In federal court in 2007, however, he acknowledged that these findings were not specific to autistic children [8], a position also adopted by a specialist panel, including Krigsman, assembled by Autism Speaks in October 2006 [9]. This stated:

"The clinical significance of LNH in children with autism is unclear given that similar findings have also been reported in children with typical development as well as children with food allergies and immune deficiencies."

It was announced in May, 2006, that ongoing scientific research on children with a condition, which Wakefield has called autistic enterocolitis, would be presented by Krigsman at the International Meeting for Autism Research in Montreal, which have not yet published in a scientific journal. Krigsman did not attend the meeting, where data was presented on a poster. In federal court, in June 2007, he said:

A: We have over 275 specimens that are picked and have been preserved properly. So that's the potential pool that was indicated in the poster.

Q: Have you submitted this at all for publication, yet?

A: I mentioned before, it's still a data gathering process.

Q: Now Doctor, were you at IMFAR conference in 2006?

A: No, I was not there.

The team's leader, Dr. Stephen Walker, warned against making any connection between his research and autism [10]

Clinical autism cases

Krigsman has sent for analysis the cerebrospinal fluid of a number of patients. Among these patients is Matthew Birt, son of the late Safe Minds principal Liz Birt. Matthew was found to have high amounts of live measles virus in his cerebral spinal fluid.[11]

Another patient, Lawrence McGowan, arrived in New York from Britain to undergo medical tests that were unavailable to him in his homeland, where treatment for children with autism and gastrointestinal disorders is allegedly routinely denied by doctors and National Health Service hospitals. Laurence is the first of many British children with autism diagnoses, and possibly comorbid colitis, that Krigsman and Wakefield have agreed to treat. Parent activists claim there are at least 2,000 children with similar disorders who are unable to get treatment in the United Kingdom. According to the Daily Mail, "Finding any form of bowel disease in autistic children is not, it seems, a smart career move these days, so many doctors are refusing even to look."

Publication

• 2002, Boris M; Goldblatt A; Krigsman A., "Laryngeal dysfunction: a common cause of respiratory distress, often misdiagnosed as asthma and responsive to antireflux therapy". Allgery Proceedings, vol 23, no 133