The vast majority of children with autism have at least one mental health condition too, new research suggests.
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Mental Health Conditions Alarmingly High Among Children with Autism, Study Finds Nearly 78 per cent of children with autism have at least one mental health condition and nearly half have two mental health conditions or more, according to a new U.S. study from the University of British Columbia’s department of psychology and the AJ Drexel Autism Institute at Drexel University (Pennsylvania). The study also found mental health conditions present in 44.8 per cent of pre-school age children with autism. The scope of the issue among that age group had not previously been established using a large, population-based sample. By contrast, the study found that only 14.1 per cent of youth without autism (ages 3-17) had mental health conditions. It is the first research since 2008 to examine the prevalence of mental health conditions among children with autism at a population level, and signals a need for healthcare systems to adapt to account for the overlap.