Dillenburger Karola, Jordan Julie-Ann, McKerr Lyn, Keenan Mickey
Centre for Behaviour Analysis, School of Education, Queen's University Belfast , Belfast , UK and.
Dev Neurorehabil. 2015 Feb;18(1):37-46. doi: 10.3109/17518423.2014.964378. Epub 2014 Oct 7.
Most of what we know about children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is based on post-diagnostic, retrospective, self-select studies. Oftentimes, there is no direct comparison between trajectories of children with ASD and children without ASD.
To circumvent both of these problems, the present secondary data analysis utilised a large-scale longitudinal general population survey of children born in the year 2000 (i.e. the Millennium Cohort Study; MCS; n = 18,522). Bi-annual MCS data were available from five data sweeps (children aged 9 months to 11 years of age).
Pre-diagnostic data showed early health problems differentiated children later diagnosed with autism from non-diagnosed peers. Prevalence was much higher than previously estimated (3.5% for 11-year olds). Post-diagnosis, trajectories deteriorated significantly for the children with ASD and their families in relation to education, health and economic wellbeing.
These findings raise many issues for service delivery and the rights of persons with disabilities and their families.
我们对自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）儿童的了解大多基于诊断后的回顾性自我选择研究。通常，ASD儿童与非ASD儿童的发展轨迹之间没有直接比较。
为避免这两个问题，本次二次数据分析利用了对2000年出生儿童进行的大规模纵向普通人群调查（即千禧队列研究；MCS；n = 18,522）。可从五次数据收集（9个月至11岁儿童）中获取每两年一次的MCS数据。
诊断前的数据显示，早期健康问题使后来被诊断为自闭症的儿童与未被诊断的同龄人有所不同。患病率比之前估计的要高得多（11岁儿童中为3.5%）。诊断后，ASD儿童及其家庭在教育、健康和经济福祉方面的发展轨迹显著恶化。
这些发现为服务提供以及残疾人士及其家庭的权利提出了许多问题。
