Thursday, May 20, 2010
Franklin Hall B Level 4 (Philadelphia Marriott Downtown)
2:00 PM
S. Lemcke
,
Regional Centre for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Aarhus University Hospital, DK-8240 Risskov, Denmark
E. Parner
,
Department of Biostatistics, Institute of Public Health, University of Aarhus, DK-8000 Århus C, Denmark
M. B. Lauritsen
,
Department B, Regional Centre for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Aarhus University Hospital, Risskov, Denmark
Background:
Studies on early symptoms of autism have indicated that it is possible to identify early signs in children before the age of two years. Only few studies have used information from prospectively collected parents’ interviews. Objectives:
To study whether prospectively collected information from mothers on their experience of taking care of the child, breast-feeding and the child’s temper during the first two years of life can predict the risk of the child later being diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Methods: In the Danish National Birth Cohort (DNBC) more than 70,000 women were interviewed about their child’s development, behaviour and growth when the child was 6 and 18 months of age. All children in Denmark diagnosed with ASD and/or mental retardation (MR) are registered in the Danish Psychiatric Central Register or the Danish National Patient Register; thus, it is possible to identify children with ASD and MR in the DNBC. Comparison of data on children with ASD with information on the mentally retarded and the typically developing children in DNBC will provide us with distinct characteristics before the age of two years of children who later develop an autistic disorder. Data are analysed using Cox proportional hazards regression.
Results: The study is ongoing; at the age of 6 and 18 months the preliminary analyses showed no statistically significant differences with regard to breast-feeding in the characteristics of children with ASD compared with typically developing children or children with MR. With respect to the child’s temper (less active than other children: HR=8.11 (95% CI: 5.26-12.5) or not a happy child: HR=2.96 (95% CI: 1.52-5.76)) and the mother’s experience of taking care of the child (has been difficult: HR=3.04 (95% CI: 1.94-4.76)) statistically significant differences at the age of 18 months was found in the preliminary analyses.
Conclusions: The results indicate that in the first two years of life mothers information about deviations in the child’s temper and her experience of taking care of the child are associated with the risk of the child later being diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder.
