Depressive Symptoms in Autistic Youth with Anxiety Disorders.

There was no comparison group of typically developing children, so the study cannot show whether these rates of depressive symptoms are higher than in non-autistic children of the same age. Only 87 children were eligible for treatment, and a quarter of the anxiety scores were missing after treatment and a third at three months, mostly because of dropout during COVID-19. Recruitment happened during the pandemic, when school closures may have raised isolation, loneliness and anxiety above usual levels, so the rates may not match your caseload. Participants were mostly white, 78% male, and parent reports came mainly from mothers with university education, so the findings may not generalise to other families. Most of the analyses were cross-sectional, so the study cannot say whether anxiety and loneliness cause depressive symptoms or the other way round. Children had to have an IQ of 70 or above and be able to communicate verbally, so this says nothing about non-speaking autistic children or those with a significant intellectual disability. Depression was measured with a parent and child questionnaire cutoff, not a diagnostic interview, and this analysis did not compare the two CBT conditions.

The supplied article text contains no funding or conflict of interest statement. It notes only that the original trial was approved by the college's Institutional Review Board.

Do not turn the 42.7% into a diagnosis of depression in autistic children. Depressive symptoms here were measured with a 13-item screening questionnaire and a cutoff score rather than a diagnostic interview, and the children were recruited during the COVID-19 pandemic when isolation and anxiety were unusually high, so the figure may not hold in your clinic.