Autism in Viet Nam: A systematic scoping review.

Only 20% of records were double-checked; one author screened, extracted and appraised everything else, and double-coding the full set was not feasible. Many of the included studies did not describe their methods, participants or analyses, which limited both comparisons between studies and the quality appraisal. The appraisal tool was developed in the Global North and may not fit research done in Viet Nam, so some 'unclear' ratings may reflect the tool rather than the study. It is hard to judge how reliable peer review is in Vietnamese journals because all media in Viet Nam is regulated, so the finding that 81% of studies were peer reviewed should be read cautiously. The literature is dominated by parents' and children's perspectives; autistic adults and anything outside services, education and causes are barely represented. Most studies came from Viet Nam, with only a handful from Vietnamese communities in the United States, Australia, Finland, the United Kingdom and Norway. As a scoping review it maps what has been studied, not whether any intervention works.

The authors received no funding for the research, authorship or publication of the article, and declared no competing interests.

Do not read this as evidence that any approach works, or as proof that dioxin exposure causes autism. The review counted and described studies rather than testing anything, and its quality ratings describe how studies were reported and appraised, which in this context may say as much about the appraisal tool as about the research itself.