From Syringe to Spoon Feeding: A Case Report of How Occupational Therapy Treatment Successfully Guided the Parents of a Child with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Prematurity in an Outpatient Clinic.

A hospital OT team worked with one autistic preschooler who would only eat from a syringe.

Parents joined every outpatient session. They learned to present the spoon, wait, and praise tiny tastes.

The clinic met weekly. No tubes, no meds—just OT coaching and mom-dad practice at home.

After weeks of coaching the child took smooth spoonfuls instead of syringe squeezes.

Meals moved from medical-looking to family-style. Parents felt calm and in charge.

Patel et al. (2023) and Bloomfield et al. (2021) show you can get the same win without driving to clinic—they used telehealth with parents as the main therapists.

Hladik et al. (2025) asked moms later; they felt surer of themselves after in-home coaching. Same parent-power idea, different couch.

Simeon et al. (2025) looked at 61 tiny studies and say most feeding papers, including this one, are just one child—so we need bigger teams before we bank on it.

You now have three ways to run feeding treatment: in-clinic OT, telehealth BA, or hybrid. Start with the setting the family will actually use. If they live far, copy Patel and go screen-to-screen. If they like hands-on help, an outpatient OT visit plus parent replay at home still works. Track bites, not jargon, and keep the plan short enough that caregivers can repeat it every meal.