A Descriptive Study on the Neonatal Morbidity Profile of Autism Spectrum Disorders, Including a Comparison with Other Neurodevelopmental Disorders

The aim of this study was to describe the profile of specific neonatal morbidities in children later diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and to compare this profile with the profile of children with hyperkinetic disorder, cerebral palsy, epilepsy or intellectual disability. This is a Danish population based cohort study, including all children born in Denmark from 1994, through 2010, and surviving the first year of life. Children with ASD as a whole have significantly elevated rates of a range of neurologic, respiratory, inflammatory, and metabolic problems in the neonatal period compared to the general population, but there are few if any indicators of a distinctive neonatal morbidity profile in ASD compared to other neurodevelopmental outcomes.