Autism could be caused by an immune system reaction which causes the brain
to swell, say researchers at John Hopkins University School of Medicine, USA. If
this is so, we may one day be able to create a test for autism, and perhaps even
develop treatment to prevent it.
Unfortunately, we cannot diagnose
autism until it has already developed in the person - the earliest diagnosis
takes place in the second year of life when signs of communication problems
appear in the child (we don't really know whether it develops or not after
birth, whether it is already there before birth).
Professor Carlos
Pardo-Villamizar , team leader, said to the BBC "These findings open new
possibilities for understanding the dynamic changes that occur in the brain of
autistic patients during childhood and adulthood. Although they may lend
themselves to the development of new medical treatments for autism, much more
research would be needed to establish the validity of this approach."
The prevalence of autism has grown over the last twenty years. Some
people wonder whether there may be some environmental trigger. Others suggest
that diagnosis is much more accurate these days. Many people in the past with
Asperger's Syndrome were not classed as autistic - today they are, hence the
numbers of autistic people today are higher than before. In most of the world,
Asperger's Syndrome was not recognised until 1994.
TYPES OF
AUTISMSeveral types have been defined along the autism spectrum,
differing in the severity of the symptoms and total disability and in the
combinations of autistic impairments with other disabilities. We present brief
accounts of some of these.
CLASSIC AUTISM, AUTISTIC DISORDER OR
KANNER'S SYNDROMEThe psychiatrist Leo Kanner of John Hopkins
University first described and named this syndrome based on 11 of his child
patients between 1932 and 1943. He noted the following common features:
-- a profound lack of affect or emotional contact with others
--
an intense wish for sameness in routines
-- muteness or abnormality of
speech
-- fascination with manipulating objects
-- high levels
of visuo-spatial skills, but major learning difficulties in other areas
-- attractive, alert and intelligent appearance.
Kanner's
observations became the criteria for early studies of the prevalence of autism.
Children (and adults) with these features have the full triad of impairments and
represent the most severely disabled end of the autism spectrum of disorders.
Autism organizations were first formed in the 1960s and 1970s by the
parents of children with classic autism. More recently these organizations have
been enlarged in scope and functions to serve those with a wider range of
autistic and pervasive developmental disorders.
ASPERGER'S
DISORDERFirst described by Hans Asperger of Vienna in 1944, whose
work was not generally known in English translation until 1981, the disorder was
not listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)
http://www.autism-biomed.org/dsm-iv.htm until 1994.
Asperger's shares with autism a severe and sustained impairment in
social interaction, and restricted and repetitive patterns of behaviour and
interests. But people with Asperger's do not have the significant delays in
language, cognition, self-help skills or adaptive behaviour that are typical in
autism; they are often physically clumsy and awkward, more obviously than
children with classic autism. Asperger's is often not recognized easily or
early, and may be misdiagnosed as Tourette's Syndrome, Attention Deficit
Disorder, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Oppositional Defiance
Disorder, or Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. As with autism, the disorder is
lifelong and no complete cure is known. Asperger's disorder may be the largest
type on the autism spectrum, affecting 35 in every 10,000 people.
People
with Asperger's may have an exceptional talent or skill with which they are
preoccupied. It is conjectured that several people of remarkable genius may have
had Asperger's--including Albert Einstein, Vladimir Nabokov, Ludwig
Wittgenstein, Bela Bartok and Andy Warhol. Of Canadian interest is a front-page
story in The Globe and Mail (1 February 2000) entitled "Was Glenn Gould
autistic?" The possibility that Asperger's Syndrome could explain Gould's social
deficiencies, obsessive perfectionism and intolerance of change was raised in
the 1996 biography by psychiatrist Peter Oswald, Glenn Gould: The Ecstasy and
Tragedy of Genius, and is now elaborated by the musicologist Timothy Maloney.
Gould was acutely sensitive to light, sound and temperature, and had a phobia
about shaking hands as well as a limited range of preferred foods. His bizarre
mannerisms as a concert performer could be understood as uncontrollable
expressions of Asperger's.
RETT'S SYNDROMEFirst
identified by the Australian, Dr Andreas Rett, in 1965, Rett's is a complex
neurological degenerative disorder that affects only girls. It is rarer than
some of the types on the autism spectrum, affecting 1 in every 10,000 girls.
From onset at about 18 months of age, its victims become profoundly and multiply
disabled and dependent on others for all their needs. Key symptoms include
hypotonia (reduced muscle tone) and such autistic-like behaviours as wringing
and waving hands. The discovery of the gene for Rett's syndrome was reported in
October 1999.