Jun 10, 2009 5:59 pm US/Eastern
Study Wants To Discover Risk Factors For Autism
BALTIMORE (WJZ) ―
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Over the past decade, the number of children diagnosed with autism has increased tenfold and doctors are not sure why.
CBS
Over the past decade, the number of children diagnosed with autism has increased tenfold and doctors are not sure why. Healthwatch reporter
Kellye Lynn says researchers at the Kennedy Krieger Institute and Johns Hopkins have embarked upon a new study to understand why this disorder has become so pervasive.
Researchers at Hopkins are working to uncover the early risk factors for autism.
Lynn and Randy Gaston suspected something was wrong with their triplets long before anyone else did.
"They weren't speaking, making developmental milestones like speaking and drinking out of a cup," Lynn said.
What their pediatrician didn't recognize was that Zachary, Nick and Hunter, now eight years old, were autistic.
"We lost precious time trying to find that diagnosis," she said.
"Those are years when you have the most impact getting the most intensive treatment," Randy said.
Autism is part of a group of developmental disabilities known as autism spectrum disorders, which affect one out of every 150 children in the US.
"There's an impairment in the child in social, communication, language skills and sometimes repetitive behaviors," said Dr. Danielle Fallin, Johns Hopkins School of Public Health.
A study has been launched to learn more aobut the early risk factors of autism.
"There's really good evidence that genes may be involved and there's a door of evidence that environmental experiences may also contribute but what we don't have is this is the particular set of things and so that's what we and others are working to figure out," Dr. Fallin said.
The Early Autism Risk Longitudinal Investigation, or Earli, will study up to 1,200 pregnant women who have already had a child with autism, following a mom through pregnancy and then for the first three years of that baby's life. It's research that could someday offer parents a chance at protecting their offspring from a disorder for which there's currently no definitive cause or cure.
Click
here to learn more about the study.
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