Operation House Call (OHC) teaches students in medical, nursing, and allied health professional schools the essential skills and mindsets to enhance the health care of persons with autism and other intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). Offered by The Arc of Massachusetts, OHC turns to families, parents and individual self-advocates as educators in a health care field that seldom focuses on more than making a diagnosis. It is a rare and important training opportunity. Through OHC, students begin to build confidence and interest in working with individuals with IDD, including autism, and their families.
Operation House Call has been a popular and valued course since 1991, initiated by two professors of medicine at Boston University, including a pediatric neurologist whose brother has autism. In 2011, The Arc of Mass began OHC at Tufts University School of Medicine and the Simmons University School of Sciences and Health Professions. Since then, we have added Yale School of Nursing, UMass Chan Medical School, UMass Tan Chingfen Graduate School of Nursing, and Harvard Medical School, totaling four medical schools and three graduate nursing schools.
The Arc is grateful to our network of volunteer families. They provide the opportunity for students to have experiential learning through home visits. In Massachusetts, OHC now has more than 250 (and growing) volunteer families teaching over 1,200 medical professionals every year. In 2023, the Arc helped pass legislation that codifies OHC into law, allowing schools to be certified for incorporating the full 6-hour OHC program into their curriculum.
