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California’s ABA Market: The Largest in the World, and the Hardest to Operate In

March 26, 2026

California accounts for roughly 15 percent of all national demand for Board Certified Behavior Analysts, has the highest recorded autism prevalence among any CDC monitoring site, and runs the most structurally complex…

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Tara Phillips and Autism Little Learners: An SLP’s 25-Year Bridge Between Speech Therapy and ABA

March 26, 2026

Tara Phillips is a licensed speech-language pathologist with more than 25 years of clinical experience supporting young autistic children. Her platform, Autism Little Learners, has grown to more than 91,000 Instagram followers,…

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Georgia’s ABA Desert: Why One of America’s Most Populous States Is Underserved

March 26, 2026

Georgia ranks among the top five states in the nation for BCBA demand, yet its 159 counties include vast rural stretches with no behavior analysts at all. A combination of partial Medicaid…

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Sasha Long and The Autism Helper: How a BCBA Built One of ABA’s Most Influential Media Platforms

March 25, 2026

Sasha Long holds a master’s degree and a BCBA credential. She is also a former special education teacher, the founder of The Autism Helper Inc.

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Mertz Taggart: The Behavioral Health Boutique That Keeps Setting the Offer Record

March 25, 2026

Naples-based Mertz Taggart has built one of the most active behavioral health M&A practices in the country, publishing the quarterly market reports that compete most directly with The Braff Group’s data and…

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Indiana Billed $340,000 Per Patient to an Autism Clinic. Now It’s Shutting That Clinic Out of Medicaid.

March 25, 2026

Indiana has moved to terminate Medicaid billing rights for one of the nation’s highest-billing autism therapy providers — acting two weeks after investigative reporting exposed a $340,000 per-patient billing average that immediately…

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The ABA Revenue Cycle Management Industry: A $2 Billion Back-Office Business Built on ABA’s Complexity

March 25, 2026

Applied behavior analysis may be the most billing-intensive specialty in outpatient healthcare. Time-based CPT codes billed in 15-minute increments, heavy prior authorization requirements that vary by payer and state, modifier rules that…

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Direct ABA Diagnosis: Why Some States Allow BCBAs to Diagnose – and What Happens When They Do

March 25, 2026

A small but growing number of states have expanded BCBA scope of practice to include autism diagnostic evaluations, a move that expands access in diagnosis-starved regions but draws sharp objections from psychology…

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Online BCBA Programs: The Accreditation Question That Will Define the Next Generation of Clinicians

March 24, 2026

The first-time BCBA exam pass rate has dropped from 66 percent in 2020 to 51 percent in 2025. The number of training programs reporting data has grown to 192.

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The ABC Academy Model: Can School-Age Bridge Programs Solve the Graduation Cliff?

March 24, 2026

The ABA industry has built a massive infrastructure for early intervention - but what happens when a child turns five and enters school? For most families, the answer has been a abrupt…

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The ABA Billing Fraud Playbook: The 7 Schemes That Keep Appearing in Federal Indictments

March 24, 2026

Ghost sessions, forged signatures, credential laundering, kickbacks for patient recruitment - the same fraud patterns appear in DOJ charging documents and OIG audit findings from Minnesota to Massachusetts to Connecticut. A forensic…

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The Autism Family Financial Toll: What ABA Therapy Actually Costs Out of Pocket

March 24, 2026

For families without comprehensive insurance coverage, a full-prescription course of ABA therapy can exceed $60,000 to $120,000 per year-or more. A ground-level examination of the math, the coverage gaps that create it,…

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The HHS-OIG ABA Audit Wave: How Federal Investigators Found $133M in Improper Billing in Indiana Alone

March 23, 2026

The HHS Office of Inspector General’s December 2024 audit of Indiana Medicaid ABA is the first of a planned seven-state federal review series - and in every state completed so far, auditors…

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The Autism Family Waitlist Crisis: How Families Are Actually Coping Right Now

March 23, 2026

The average ABA waitlist is measured in months - sometimes more than a year. In that time, children lose ground, parents improvise, and a multi-billion-dollar industry demonstrates that it has built capacity…

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Assent-Based ABA: The Practice Reform That’s Becoming Standard

March 23, 2026

For decades, ABA therapy operated on parent consent alone. A child’s willingness to participate was treated as secondary. That is changing fast, and assent is becoming one of the clearest fault lines…

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Early Diagnosis at 14 Months: What New Research on Infant ASD Screening Means for Early Intervention

March 23, 2026

The nationwide average age at autism diagnosis is still 47 months. New research shows reliable identification is possible by 14 to 20 months - if pediatricians screen the right way.

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The Full M&A Map of ABA: Every Major Deal Since 2015, Annotated

March 22, 2026

From Great Point’s founding bet on Autism Learning Partners in 2010 to Blackstone’s $600 million wipeout and Roper’s $1. 65 billion software grab, a decade of private equity transformed - and at…

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RBT Turnover: The 40% Annual Rate That’s Breaking ABA Clinics

March 22, 2026

Registered Behavior Technicians deliver roughly 85% of all direct ABA therapy hours. Their median tenure is one year.

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All 50 States Passed the Autism Insurance Mandate. Not All of Them Actually Meant It.

March 21, 2026

Tennessee completed the map in 2019. Every state now has some form of law requiring insurance coverage for autism therapy.

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The ABA EHR Wars: Why No Electronic Health Record Has Cracked the Market

March 21, 2026

The ABA therapy industry runs on software that was not designed for it, software that was designed for it but does not do everything it needs to, or some brittle combination of…

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AI in ABA: The Five Companies That Are Actually Using It

March 21, 2026

Every ABA software company claims to use artificial intelligence. Most are describing basic automation with a marketing department.

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Colombia, the Philippines, and the Global BCBA: How ABA Companies Are Offshoring Their Back Office

March 20, 2026

A quiet transformation is underway in the business operations of American ABA therapy companies. Facing a domestic labor market where BCBA positions go unfilled for months, where administrative staff turnover mirrors clinical…

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CurativeAI: Inside the $9.8M Technology Bet Christopher Barnett Is Building Inside ABA Centers

March 20, 2026

Christopher Barnett did not build ABA Centers of America the way most ABA companies are built. He did not take private equity money.

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The 1099 BCBA: Why Independent Contracting Is Growing – and What It Costs the Industry

March 20, 2026

A generation of BCBAs is leaving salaried positions at PE-backed ABA companies to work independently. They cite burnout, caseload pressure, unpaid overtime, and a desire for clinical autonomy.

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UnitedHealthcare’s ABA Prior Authorization Playbook: How the Nation’s Largest Insurer Is Managing – and Limiting – Autism Therapy

March 19, 2026

UnitedHealth Group is the largest health insurance company in the United States, covering more than 50 million people and generating nearly $448 billion in revenue in 2025. Through its behavioral health subsidiary…

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Medicaid MCO vs. Fee-for-Service: Why the Same Child Gets Different ABA Coverage in the Same State

March 19, 2026

Two children live in the same city. Both have autism. Both qualify for Medicaid. Both are entitled to medically necessary ABA therapy under the federal EPSDT mandate. But one is enrolled in…

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The 2027 CPT Code Overhaul: What Six New Codes and the Death of T-Codes Mean for ABA Billing

March 19, 2026

In September 2025, the American Medical Association’s CPT Editorial Panel approved the most significant revision to ABA billing codes since the field received its first permanent CPT codes in 2019. Six new…

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The EPSDT Mandate: The Federal Law That States Keep Violating on ABA

March 18, 2026

The Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnostic, and Treatment mandate is the most powerful protection families of autistic children have under federal law. It requires Medicaid to cover all medically necessary services for…

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The $14 Billion Line Item: How ABA Became Medicaid’s Fastest-Growing Budget Problem — and Why Every State Is Now Deciding What to Do About It

March 18, 2026

Medicaid spending on Applied Behavior Analysis therapy grew 279 percent from 2018 to 2024, reaching $14.49 billion across all states. Indiana's ABA spending increased 2,800 percent in six years. Nebraska's grew 1,700…

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A Diagnosis, a Mission, and a $400 Million Bet: How Lighthouse Autism Center Became the Midwest’s Leading ABA Provider — and Why It’s Just Getting Started

March 18, 2026

Gregg and Sandy Maggioli founded Lighthouse Autism Center in 2012 after their son's autism diagnosis led them through Indiana's near-empty early intervention landscape. Twelve years and two private equity rounds later —…

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