• B.A. at Cornell University
• M.D. at Washington University School of Medicine

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Camp HOPE Camp provides fun for HIV-positive kids Aug. 19, 2005 -- Camp HOPE lives up to its name. The three-day camp, part of a larger outreach called Project ARK, gives HIV-positive children a chance to swim, ride horses and simply have fun. Kim Donica, director of Project ARK and research administrator for pediatric infectious disease, discusses the project in the following interview with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

It's never too soon Children's earliest relationships set the stage for life July 26, 2005 -- A baby's first relationship is the most important. A child's first relationship can begin in the womb as a parent reads or talks to the unborn baby. An infant's first relationship is the most important because it begins the foundation for all future relationships, says School of Medicine child psychiatrist John Constantino.

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Autism or Something Else? ABCNews.com Jan. 8, 2007 -- WUSTL psychiatry and pediatrics professor John Constantino writes about the need for early diagnosis of developmental disorders in children. Neurodevelopmental delays in any area can interfere with normal processes and behaviors in characteristic ways, but there remains considerable controversy over the question of when you can first recognize problems. Autism is a primary disorder of social development whose earliest signs are usually apparent by 18 months, but may be recognizable even earlier.

His clinical interests include psychiatric and developmental disorders in children, including autism, psychiatric complications of medical disorders and abnormally aggressive behavior. In another of his research projects, Constantino coordinates a preventive intervention program for disadvantaged urban families, in which early parent-child relationships are enhanced in the setting of an infant center. That study is designed to promote normal social development in disadvantaged children in order to avoid problems later in life.

Constantino came to Washington University School of Medicine as a student in 1984 and returned in 1993, following residencies in both pediatrics and psychiatry and a fellowship in child psychiatry at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York.