The number of kids with autism seems to have gone up, but what does it mean?

RODALE NEWS, EMMAUS, PA—Previous investigations of autism rates indicated 1 in 150 children were living with the condition, but a new national survey of parents found that the prevalence of autism-spectrum disorders is actually 1 in 91 children, accounting for about 1 percent of all children in the U.S. "We hope these new numbers will create an immediate shift in priorities, especially within the CDC [the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] and the National Institutes of Health," says National Autism Association board member Kelly Vanicek. "This nation's children need the CDC's full attention, and we are again asking President Obama to declare autism an epidemic and a national health crisis."

THE DETAILS: The report, titled “The Prevalence of Parent-Reported Diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder Among Children in the United States, 2007,” was published this week in the journal Pediatrics. The data used came from a telephone survey of parents conducted by the Health Resources and Services Administration and the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics. Nearly 80,000 parents of children between the ages of 3 and 17 were asked if they had ever been told by a healthcare provider that their child had autism, Asperger’s disorder, pervasive developmental disorder (PDD), or another autism-spectrum disorder (ASD). If parents said yes, they were asked if their child currently had an ASD, and to indicate how severe the condition is.

The study found that 1 in 91—an estimated 637,000 children ages 3 to 17—were living with an ASD diagnosis at the time of the 2007 survey. In 2002, the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network had reported autism rates of 1 in 150 among 8-year-olds. Researchers suggest the increased prevalence might be partly explained by methodological differences between the surveys, such as the inclusion of Asperger’s disorder, PDD, and other ASDs in the current analysis. Overall increases in public awareness and identification of ASD may also play a role in the higher incidence number. Previous studies have shown the average age of diagnosis is getting younger; finding the condition sooner leads to an increase in total prevalence at any one point in time.

Odds for having autism were four times higher for boys than for girls, and white children were more likely than black children or multiracial children to have autism; half of the autism cases were described by parents as mild. About 38 percent of the children who were ever diagnosed with ASD were reported by their parents to no longer have that diagnosis. Researchers said that could be due to the difficulty with diagnosing very young children who may no longer meet the criteria for ASD as they grow older. Other children may have been diagnosed with other developmental, behavioral, or mental health problems, such as ADHD or anxiety disorders, when they got older.