Indian Council of Medical Research Advanced Centre for Evidence Based Child Health, Chandigarh, India.
Department of Pediatrics, Advanced Pediatrics Centre, Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India.
Neurol India. 2019 Jan-Feb;67(1):100-104. doi: 10.4103/0028-3886.253970.
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a developmental disability and is of public health importance. It affects not only the child and the family. It also has direct and indirect cost implications on the nation that are incurred in providing health care, support for education, and rehabilitative services. There is a lack of evidence-based estimate of the population prevalence of ASD in India. Therefore, this systematic review was aimed at determining the prevalence of ASD in the Indian population.
We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis of the published studies evaluating the prevalence of ASD in the community setting. A search within the published literature was conducted from different databases (PubMed, OvidSP, and EMBASE). The analysis of data was done using STATA MP12 (StataCorp, College Station, TX, USA).
Four studies were included in this systematic review. Of the four included studies, one had studied both urban and rural populations, and the other three had studied the urban populations only. The study from the rural setting showed a pooled percentage prevalence of 0.11 [95% confidence interval (CI) 0.01-0.20] in children aged 1-18 years; and, four studies conducted in the urban setting showed a pooled percentage prevalence of 0.09 (95% CI 0.02-0.16) in children aged 0-15 years.
The scarcity of high-quality population-based epidemiological studies on ASD in India highlights an urgent need to study the burden of ASD in India. The proper acquisition of data related to the prevailing burden of ASD in India would lead to a better development of rehabilitative services in our country.
自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）是一种发育障碍，具有公共卫生重要性。它不仅影响儿童及其家庭，还对国家的医疗保健、教育支持和康复服务产生直接和间接的成本影响。印度缺乏基于证据的 ASD 人群患病率估计值。因此，本系统评价旨在确定印度人群中 ASD 的患病率。
我们对评估社区环境中 ASD 患病率的已发表研究进行了系统评价和荟萃分析。从不同的数据库（PubMed、OvidSP 和 EMBASE）中进行了文献检索。使用 STATA MP12（StataCorp，德克萨斯州大学城，美国）对数据进行分析。
本系统评价纳入了四项研究。这四项研究中，有一项研究了城市和农村人群，另外三项研究仅研究了城市人群。农村研究显示，1-18 岁儿童的总体患病率为 0.11%（95%置信区间 0.01-0.20）；而四项城市研究显示，0-15 岁儿童的总体患病率为 0.09%（95%置信区间 0.02-0.16）。
印度缺乏高质量的 ASD 人群流行病学研究，这突显了迫切需要研究印度 ASD 的负担。正确获取与印度 ASD 流行负担相关的数据，将有助于我们国家更好地发展康复服务。
