Admittedly, I have been out of touch for most of the day but I know that the new #Autism statistics have been released. The numbers are pretty scary if you ask me.
However, I just have to ask, what’s the point?
I mean, as soon as the new DSM is released and the new criteria takes affect, those numbers will no longer be accurate. Does that make sense?
Are they looking to sorta cook the books, so to speak? In other words, if a large segment of the autistic community is going to quite possibly be removed by the autism diagnostic criteria, won’t that affect the statistics?
Instead of 1/88, what will it be?
I just don’t understand the point of putting out the statistics now, if they’re doing to be undiagnosing a whole lot of people in the near future.
Thoughts?
**Thanks for reading**
-Lost and Tired
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Posted from WordPress for Android so please forgive any typos as auto-correct and I don’t see eye to eye. 🙂
An cool blog post right there mate ! Cheers for posting .
There was an interesting segment on FOX News on Friday regarding this latest update. Of greater importance ( IMHO ) is trying to narrow down the possible / probable cause of Autism …. so many different things have been pointed to , but still nothing that can be said for sure ( example : mercury in vaccines was once considered a possible cause , but that was taken out of vaccines several years ago and we are still seeing an increase in Autism , in greater numbers even ). It would be nice if the Gov. whould sponser better research into this instead of throwing away our hard earned tax dollars on stupid things. I work with a Pediatrician by the way and we have several kids in our office with Autism.
It really doesn't matter to me what the stats are, the fact remains many children and adults will still need help, I wonder – will they get it? That's what worries me most about this change in measures, it won't change the fact that many people need help.
The people who are affected by autism or others on spectrum, they cannot advocate for themselves, we as parents, family and friends must ensure they get the help they need, no matter what the stats say!
You will just have 1 big number in place of all the little numbers. Where do you think people will be left out where they are currently included in the ASD category? I have not heard that it will bring much change at all. But you clearly feel otherwise.
It's a useful data point to have – if there's a huge drop after the changes in the DSM V, it will be easy to see the effects the redefinition had. If anything, I think publishing now makes it harder for 'cookers' to 'cook' – if we had nothing to go on now, new numbers could be published after the change, and be held up to say, "look, it's getting better!" when it's really not.
It's nice to hear from you again. You make a lot of sense, not that it should surprise me> 🙂 It's just frustrating from my perspective because these new numbers have created a media frenzy and a few months everything is going to change again. However, your right because it will be really interesting to see the new data as it comes in after the proposed changes take effect.
Hope all is well with you my friend. 🙂
That is a REALLY good point