Many children, especially girls, diagnosed with autism several years too late

From the St. Louis Post-Dispatch Parents Talk Back blog:

New research from a Wash U. professor in the school of social work suggests children — particularly girls — get diagnosed with autism several years too late.

“Timely identification and diagnosis of an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) can impact a child’s development and is the key to opening the door to the services and therapies available to children with autism,” says Paul Shattuck, Ph.D., assistant professor at the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis. “Unfortunately, our research shows that the average age of autism diagnosis is nearly six years old, which is three to four years after diagnosis is possible.”

Shattuck is the lead author of an article on the timing of ASD identification in the current issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. He and study co-authors used data from 13 sites around the country that were funded by the CDC to collect information from the health and education records of eight year olds with a wide variety of developmental problems in 2002.

Research found that females were identified later than males and that early diagnosis was usually linked to a more severe or obvious cognitive impairment.

Shattuck says that parents need to trust their instincts. “If there is something about your child’s development that concerns you, or if your child is exhibiting some symptoms of autism such as a failure to make eye contact, not speaking one word by 16 months, or not responding to their name, talk to your child’s pediatrician,” he says. “If the doctor ignores your concerns, seek a second opinion.”

I know the earlier a child get diagnosed, the better chances for treatment and intervention, but isn’t it possible that some late bloomers also might get mislabeled with a serious disorder they don’t really have?