The Politics of Autism discusses health care, and explains that autism services can be complicated, creating difficulties for autistic people and their families.
Objective: Mental health conditions (MHCs) have substantial personal and economic costs for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD); yet, a current population-based prevalence estimate is lacking.
Methods: This study included 42,283 caregivers of children (ages 3–17 years) from the 2016 population-based National Survey of Children’s Health. Prevalence and correlates of caregiver-reported MHCs were estimated in children with ASD and compared with those in children with intellectual disability (ID), children with special health care needs (SHCN), and “all others” (no ASD, SHCN, or ID).
Results: 77.7% of children with ASD had ≥ 1 MHC; 49.1% had ≥ 2. The most common MHCs were behavior/conduct problem (60.8%), anxiety problem (39.5%), attention deficit disorder (ADD)/attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) (48.4%), and depression (15.7%). Substance abuse was the only MHC less common in ASD. MHCs were more common in youth with ASD versus SHCN, “all other” youth, and those with ID. MHCs were common in ASD by ages 3–5 years (44.8% ≥ 1 condition) and increased with age (85.9% ≥ 1 condition, ages 12–17 years). Among children with ASD, girls had twice the odds of an anxiety problem, those with ID had 4 times the odds of behavior/conduct problem, and those with childhood adversity had greater odds of an anxiety problem (odds ratio [OR] = 2.66) and ADD/ADHD (OR = 1.99).
Conclusions: Caregiver-reported MHCs are prevalent in children with ASD in the US from a young age and characterize > 85% by adolescence. There is an outsized need for effective MHC assessment and treatment of these youth that demands expedient innovation in both MHC and developmental disability policy and practice.
At Healio, Joe Grimigna reports on the study:
Evidence-based assessment and treatment of [mental health conditions] in ASD should be used to reduce this demand by clarifying which children are most in need of and likely to benefit from available treatments,” Kerns and colleagues wrote. “Nonetheless, there is an incongruence between the ubiquity of [mental health conditions] in ASD and the disconnected disciplines and support systems for developmental disability and mental health that exist. Advances in research are likely to be realized only if steps are also taken to implement health care policies and training initiatives that support integrated developmental and mental health care going forward.”
Indeed, the fragmentation of the service system is a pervative problem for people with developmental disorders.
