Washington, Oct 9 (IANS) Nearly half of autistic children are four times as likely to wander off or run away from the safety of their homes than unaffected siblings, found researchers at the Interactive Autism Network (IAN), largest online autism research initiative in the US.
The network is part of the Kennedy Krieger Institute.
This study offers the most comprehensive estimate of children running away from home, and used a US community-based sample of more than 1,200 autistic children.
“Since the launch of IAN, we have heard from families of children with autism that their children often place themselves in danger by wandering or eloping (sic),” says Paul Law, senior author and director of the IAN Project at the Kennedy Krieger, the journal Paediatrics reports.
“These are the first published findings in the US that provide an estimate of the number of children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) who not only wander or elope, but go missing long enough to cause real concern,” says Law, according to a Kennedy Krieger statement.
Participants included families of 1,218 children with ASD and 1,076 of their siblings without ASD, recruited through an online questionnaire.
The primary outcome measured by researchers was running away status, beginning at age four, when running away and wandering are atypical behaviours.
“Missing” status was a secondary outcome; a child who bolted and had gone missing long enough to cause concern was coded as missing, whereas those who had not were coded as “non-missing”.
