OBJECTIVE To determine the relation of neonatal cranial ultrasound abnormalities to autism spectrum disorders (ASD) in low birth weight (LBW) adult survivors, a population at increased ASD risk. STUDY DESIGN This is a secondary analysis of a prospectively-followed regional birth cohort of 1105 LBW infants systematically screened for perinatal brain injury with cranial ultrasound in the first ...

OBJECTIVE To determine cytokines and MHC class II alleles in Japanese patients with adult Still's disease (ASD) and clarify the association between those profiles and chronic articular disease. METHODS Of 35 patients with ASD (13 men, 22 women, mean age at onset 34.0 yr), 17 (49%) had chronic arthritis (>6 months, chronic articular ASD) and 18 (51%) lacked chronic arthritis (systemic ASD). Cy...

BACKGROUND Very little is known about the context of caregiving by parents of adults with autism or about the perceived impacts of continued patterns of co-residence vs. out-of-family living. In the present study, maternal assessments of residential status, involvement with adult children living in a non-family setting, and the impacts on mothers of their residential arrangements were examined....

OBJECTIVE The present study aimed to extract discriminating indicators for diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) from personal backgrounds and past history among depressed adult outpatients. METHODS Subjects were 430 depressed adults, consisting of patients with ASD (n=70) and those without ASD (n=360). Group comparison and discriminant analysis was conducted with regard to backgrounds ...

Internal action models (IAMs) are brain templates for sensory-motor coordination underlying diverse behaviors. An emerging theory suggests that impaired IAMs are a common theme in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, whether impaired IAMs occur across sensory systems and how they relate to the major phenotype of ASD, namely impaired social communication, remains unclear. Olfaction relies on...

There is an increasing body of evidence suggesting a significant comorbidity between psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or autism-spectrum disorders (ASD). Recently, research on psychosis-proneness in otherwise healthy individuals has been a promising way to better understand the mechanisms underlying psychosis. As both ADHD and ASD sym...

Current theories of the pathophysiology of autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have focused on abnormal temporal coordination of neural activity in cortical circuits as a core impairment of the disorder. In the current study, we examined the possibility that gamma-band activity may be crucially involved in aberrant brain functioning in ASD. Magneto-encephalographic (MEG) data were recorded from 13 ...

Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) are a set of neurodevelopmental disorders with an early-onset and a strong genetic component in their pathogenesis. According to genetic and epidemiological data, ASD relatives present personality traits similar to, but not as severe as the defining features of ASD, which have been indicated as the "Broader Autism Phenotype" (BAP). BAP features seem to be more pr...

Atrial septal defects (ASDs), allowing blood to directly communicate between systemic and pulmonary arterial circulations at the atrial level, are among the most common congenital cardiac anomalies seen in the adult population. The degree of shunting across an ASD is directly related to the area of the ASD and inversely related to the compliance of the combined atrial-ventricular chambers on ei...

For individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) work participation is a challenge, as shown by their low employment rates. The aim of this study was to investigate which factors predict work participation, finding work as well as maintaining employment, of young adults with ASD as well as ADD. We obtained data on 563 individuals with ASD ...