South Goa district hospital gets one new autism case every week

PANAJI: The paediatric outpatient department (OPD) at the South Goa district hospital records a new autism case every week. The pandemic not allowing people to socialise may have led to delayed diagnosis, said doctors.
National health mission director and paediatrician Dr Ira Almeida, who conducts the weekly OPD at the district hospital, said the rise in autism could be because families remained indoors for more than a year due to Covid-19 and parents were unable to detect lack of socialising skills in their children.
“In the pandemic everybody was online and children were too happy to use mobiles, and the spectrum remained hidden. But now, if you put children having autism in a set up where there are a lot of people, and activity, they will be in distress and their symptoms will be obvious,” Almeida said.
The abnormality is normally detected by the time a child is three years old and worried parents consult a paediatrician to know why their child is not speaking even by that age.
However, the condition can be detected as early as when the child is 15 months old, the paediatrician said.
She said it is better to detect autism early rather than wait for obvious signs such as a child’s inability to communicate or interact with people, when there are more people.
Her attempt, she said, is to have a place where such autism spectrum disorders can be diagnosed early.
“If autism is detected when a child is 15 months old, there will be better scope for intervention with good results,” she said.
Paediatrician Dr Shivanand Gauns also said that while there is no sudden rise in autism cases, more cases are being reported now as parents were not able to seek medical help for the past two years due the pandemic.
“As compared to the last decade, autism is on rise. One in 80 children is found to have some sort of autism,” Gauns said.
While several studies have been conducted, he said, the world is yet to know what causes autism spectrum disorder.
“Various theories such as genetics, environmental factors, diet are put forward as possible causes of autism but none has been able to pinpoint why autism occurs,” he said.