Akron, OH: "New center focuses on early autism care"

Mar 25, 2025,  Signal: New autism center in Akron helps kids build communication skills

Just a year ago, four-year-old Niko Wasiela couldn’t tell his family what he needed.

“He would just scream until we figured out what he wanted,” said his mother, Madelynn Sutterluety.

Now, after months of therapy, Niko — who was diagnosed with Level 3 autism spectrum disorder at age 3 — is beginning to communicate using words.

Niko is one of the children receiving care at the Tom and Jill Zidian Family Autism Center, which Akron Children’s hospital opened in November to expand evaluation and therapy services for children with autism and other developmental disabilities. The facility helps bring expanded services together in one place.

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New center focuses on early autism care

The center offers families like Niko’s diagnostic assessments, behavioral therapy, social skills programs and parent support services designed to help at different stages of their child’s development.

One of those programs is the Early Start Denver Model, an early childhood intervention based on applied behavior analysis, or ABA.

“We bring children into a classroom setting and teach them skills in a natural environment,” said Dr. Jessica Foster, the director of the program. “The goal is to help them learn how to interact with peers, manage their behavior and participate in a classroom.”

The intervention typically runs for about the same length of time as a preschool day. Some children attend the program while remaining enrolled in their regular preschool, allowing them to receive specialized therapy while continuing to socialize and learn with other children.

A waiting area in Akron Children’s hospital’s Tom and Jill Zidian Family Autism Center. (Ryan Loew / Signal Akron)

Foster said the model is relatively new to the region and may be the only program of its kind in the area.

Niko attends two-hour therapy sessions twice a week through the program.

Over time, his mother began noticing changes.

“He’s communicating now. He’s talking now,” Sutterluety said. “It kind of just flipped a switch in him.”

Just a year ago, she said, he would panic if another child came near him. Now he participates in activities with another young patient during part of his therapy sessions.

His progress has also changed daily life at home.

“We used to just have to play the guessing game constantly,” she said. “Now if he wants something to drink, he’ll bring us his cup.”  . . .

Addressing a growing need for autism services

Before the autism center opened, Akron Children’s provided developmental pediatric care but lacked dedicated behavioral health and social skills programming for children with autism.

“That was a real gap,” Foster said.

The center was designed to offer what Foster describes as a “menu of services” that support children and families at different stages of development.

“We didn’t want to create something where we were serving a couple of kids for 40 hours every week,” Foster said. 

On a typical day, about 35 children move through the center for evaluations, therapy sessions and group programs.