Positive Autism Screening in Children Born Preterm.
Nuria Lisset Ontiveros Perez, Pamela M Rios, Stella Firth Wang and 3 others
PMID 40471398WHAT IT FOUND
41 of 337 very preterm children screened positive for autism at 18 to 30 months.
Earlier gestational age was linked to positive screens. Positive-screen children who were language tested all scored low, but 37 negative-screen children also scored low.
Key findings
0141 of 337 very preterm children had a positive autism screen.
02Each additional week of gestational age was associated with 25% lower odds of a positive autism screen.
03Among children with language scores, no child in the positive-screen group scored above 85, but 37 children in the negative-screen group had low language scores.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
This analysis used records from one clinic, so the screening pattern may not match other preterm follow-up programs. The study reports autism screening results, not confirmed autism diagnoses, and the dataset did not include which children were diagnosed with autism. The positive screen group included moderate and high risk scores, which the authors say may inflate the proportion with elevated autism likelihood. Data were incomplete because the collection period included the COVID pandemic; some visits were postponed or cancelled, some were conducted via telehealth, and early pandemic visits often lacked developmental testing. Language scores were available for 117 children, so the language findings cannot be applied to every screened child.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that a positive autism screen means the child has autism, or that a low language score alone means autism. The dataset did not include confirmed autism diagnoses, and 37 children with negative screens also had low language scores.