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(Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Psychiatric problems in mom or dad are associated with an increased risk of a child having autism, according to new research.
"We are trying to determine whether autism is more common among families with other psychiatric disorders," study author Julie Daniels, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the UNC School of Public Health's epidemiology and maternal and child health departments, was quoted as saying. "Establishing an association between autism and other psychiatric disorders might enable future investigators to better focus on genetic and environmental factors that might be shared among these disorders."
For the study, researchers reviewed data on 1,237 children born between 1977 and 2003 who were diagnosed with autism before the age of 10. They compared those results with 30,925 other children who were matched for age, gender, year of birth and hospital. They then looked to see if either the mother or father had been hospitalized for a mental disorder.
Study authors say that mothers and fathers diagnosed with schizophrenia were about twice as likely to have a child diagnosed with autism. Researchers also saw higher rates of depression and personality disorders among mothers of autistic children. They say they hope this information will help in the search for the cause of autism. They say it may eventually help identify opportunities to prevent or treat the disease, if a genetic or environmental factor is established.
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SOURCE: Pediatrics, 2008;121:e1357-e1362
This article was reported by Ivanhoe.com, who offers Medical Alerts by e-mail every day of the week. To subscribe, go to: http://www.ivanhoe.com/newsalert/.
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