Grandparents 'may be first to spot autism in a child'

Conclusions These cross-sectional parent and family surveys explore the factors that may be associated with the timing of diagnosis of autism spectrum disorders. It's important to put these findings into the right context. The surveys found grandparents, particularly maternal grandmothers, were often the first to recognise the signs of ASD. But this doesn't necessarily mean grandmothers have some sort of "superpower" for recognising developmental conditions. The fact that in a quarter of cases close family members suspected a problem before the parents themselves may reveal that people slightly removed from a family's day-to-day life may notice things people who spend constant time with a child may not. But this study doesn't prove cause and effect – that is, though it found grandparents often recognised the diagnosis, or were linked with slightly earlier diagnosis, it didn't explore the process by which each child was diagnosed. And it hasn't proved that the grandparent was actually instrumental in leading to the confirmed diagnosis. Other limitations of this study include the fact the methods the researchers used aren't completely clear. They don't say how they identified their study sample, or give details of the surveys the parents and family members were given. This also appears to be a US sample, though location is unclear, so the findings may not be representative of people in the UK.  Overall, the intricacies of people's feelings, and how and why ...
Source: NHS News Feed - Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Pregnancy/child Mental health Neurology Source Type: news