Health News
After High School, Teens with Autism Struggle
Schools offer many programs to help children with autism succeed. After high school, teens with autism may struggle to move on to other activities, like college or work.
Virtual Reality Program for Autism
Reading body language and facial expressions of others helps us relate to one another, and it is how we learn to understand how other people are feeling. Autism often creates difficulty with these types of social skills.
Autism and Schizophrenia Genes linked
Scientists have discovered an unexpected overlap between genes implicated in autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders with mental illnesses such as schizophrenia.
Writing in the April 27 issue of the journal Cell, the team’s findings support the idea of “a neurodevelopmental component to adult-onset neuropsychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia”. Neurodevelopmental disorders typically appear in childhood, while schizophrenia tends to afflict older adolescents and young adults. Since these diseases are not classified together, the study’s finding that neurodevelopmental ...
Autism Diagnosis Rules Likely to Change
Next year, the American Psychiatric Association will likely revise how autism is defined. Years of research about the complex nature of the disorder is leading to new diagnostic rules.
Smoking While Pregnant & Autism Not Linked
As the search continues for environmental factors that may contribute to the increasing autism cases, researchers are looking in every nook and cranny for possible associations.
Why Pick On Children With Autism?
Because of problems with social interaction shared by most children diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorders ( ASD ), they tend to lead more solitary lives and report higher instances of being the targets of bullies.
Horseback Riding as a Treatment for Autism
Therapeutic horseback riding teaches riding skills to people with disabilities with the goal of improving mental and physical health. Children with autism spectrum disorders may benefit from this type of experience.
Arriving on Time Best for the Mind
Being born early or late already carries some health risks for both mothers and their newborns. Now there's evidence an early or late birth can worsen symptoms of children with autism.
Mama's Diabetes May Hurt Baby's Brain
Just as a healthy mother is more likely to give birth to a healthy baby, an unhealthy mother has a higher chance of having an unhealthy baby. A mother with diabetes, for example, may put her child's brain at risk.
Autism on the Rise
New data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that 1 in 88 children is identified as having an autism spectrum disorder ( ASD ).