Tracking health in autistic adults, and more

Lifelong outcomes: Autistic people have more health issues and higher rates of mortality than their counterparts in the general population, according to two recent publications. Autistic adults have a higher prevalence of type 2 diabetes, hypertension, obesity and inflammatory bowel disease than do their non-autistic peers, one study found. And more deaths occurred in a cohort of people diagnosed with autism as children than in an age- and sex-matched cohort of non-autistic people, the other study reported. The researchers on both papers call for greater monitoring and support for autistic people across their lifespan. 

Autism research spotted this week: 

• “The influence of language and cognition on intervention effects in young autistic children: A meta-regression analysis” Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research
  See also: “Methodological issues plague studies of early autism interventions”
• “Uncovering causal relationships in single-cell omic studies with causarray” Briefings in Bioinformatics
  See also: “New tool may help untangle downstream effects of autism-linked genes“

• “Examining genetic variants associated with FOXP1 syndrome through molecular dynamics of its DNA-binding domain and self-organizing maps” Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling
• “Genetic overlap and shared risk loci between autism spectrum disorder and cardiometabolic traits” Molecular Psychiatry