First comment:

For about four and a half decades I have been actually assisting persons with all types of disabilities, and not just with autism. Many of the persons I am currently assisting have a diagnosis of mental illness but based on my own extensive experience I believe that some might now receive a diagnosis of autism under the much broader new definition of diagnosis since the early 1990s, which according to a 2005 scientific article co-authored by Michelle Dawson has resulted in a several-fold increase in the number of persons diagnosed with autism.

My own son Ben, age 36 completely nonverbal and considered “low functioning,” was diagnosed with autism under the much narrower old definition in January 1977 before his fifth birthday by Dr. Peter B. Rosenberger, a pediatric neurologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, to whom I was referred by Barbara Cutler, the mother of Rob Cutler of Arlington, Massachusetts. According to information I have read from websites that Michelle Dawson posted, Michelle Dawson at about age 30 in the early 1990s was first diagnosed with autism under what I understand to be the much broader new definition by an unnamed psychologist whose credentials as an autism expert are not disclosed.

Second Comment:

Concerning a recent article “Psychosis and Autism as Diametrical Disorders of the Social Brain” by Bernard Crespi and Christopher Badcock:

I would not describe their new theory as autism and schizophrenia being part of the same spectrum. Instead, their theory is that “normal” is in the middle and autism is in one direction away from normal and schizophrenia is in the opposite direction away from normal. One implication is that persons with autism are unlikely to develop schizophrenia, even though as adults the outward appearance may seem similar. One step further might be that adults who
originally were diagnosed as having schizophrenia but now claim they are on the autism spectrum might really have schizophrenia and not at all autism because they are diametrical according to this new theory. It is possible I seriously misunderstand their theory and its implications.

Which is why testing alone is not acceptable practice anymore.

A good diagnosis is based on evident from a number of sources: tests, diagnostic interviews, reports from others who know the person and so on… essentially an exercise in building up a grounded theory about the situation in which that person exists… this is the only real way to get an accurate diagnosis, and counting points will not cut it.

Or, in schools, as having Learning Disabilities.

The impact on the numbers is undoubtedly light, but there is not a bright line between schizophrenia and Aspergers. Indeed in an Aspergian’s family tree schizophrenia is more frequent than in the family of someone without. How many with Aspergers would in a previous time, be diagnosed with schizophrenia?

Yes, it was a lifetime of many different psychiatric diagnoses including schizophrenia and psychosis. He had been institutionalized several times over his lifetime, so from the records and his family members, he had enough for a psychiatrist he was seeing more recently to make the diagnosis.

I was “pushing for an autism diagnosis”,but I needed to have the severity of my disease as a child,validated.I insisted,that this,and my developmental delays factored in to the diagnosis.Also because Asperger’s is rarely,if ever occurs with medical problems as severe as mine.

You need to go back to the medical literature, published before 1980,and look at all that was written up on “childhood schizophrenia”,which is what autism was called then.This was almost as common as autism is now.It was thought you had to be retarded,or nonverbal to have autism.I had recieved such a diagnosis myself,when I was eleven.

I doubt there are ANY self-diagnosed “aspies” that can say this.

Apparently another member of Parliament, Dean Wells, said that “Queensland state schoolchildren were being diagnosed with autism at twice the rate of those in other states, to attract extra education resources.

Comments from a private pediatrian, Michael McDowell, are of interest:

private pediatrician Michael McDowell said that suggestions medical specialists were deliberately misdiagnosing autism to attract education funding were “slanderous”.

“What the medical specialists are doing is trying their very best under the circumstances to obtain the services that we believe society should be providing to vulnerable children,” said Associate Professor McDowell, who specialises in childhood development and behavioural disorders.

“We have an educational system that provides essentially no support for children unless we categorise them. It’s really pushing medical specialists to categorise children who are in the milder end of the spectrum where they would normally feel uncomfortable about that categorisation.”

Mr Wells said figures showed 2 per cent of Queensland state school students had autism spectrum disorders, compared with 0.07 per cent of students in NSW, 0.56 per cent in Victoria, 0.59 per cent in Western Australia and 0.7 per cent in South Australia.

The figures were based on 2007 and 2008 data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics and state education departments.

Mr Wells based his claim on a Journal of Pediatric and Child Health article published in 2005.

But Associate Professor McDowell, who was a co-author on the article, accused Mr Wells of misrepresenting the research.

I’ve found Welford’s comments to be especially of interest as we live in New Jersey, which (according to the 2007 figures released by the CDC) has the highest autism rate, a 1 in 94. When the figure came out, there was a lot of talk about how the NJ environment could have caused an increase and some speculation about people moving to NJ for the services, but not that autism was being overdiagnosed.