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Autism is a neurological disorder that can have a wide array of different symptoms. It is generally known that autism impacts both males and females equally, but their time of diagnosis is dramatically different.
According to a study published in The BMJ, boys are about four times more likely to get their diagnosis during their childhood than girls.
As girls enter their teen years, their diagnosis rates go up dramatically until they have essentially match the males by the time they are about 20 years old.
In the past, this was largely explained by the fact that girls are usually better at communicating from a younger age. So, boys who have symptoms of autism are noticed earlier on than girls.
This new study was conducted in Sweden, and the researchers looked at diagnosed rates of autism across 2.7 million people born from 1985 to 2022. These people were tracked until the age of 37 at the latest.
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Of the 2.7 million people, 78,522 were diagnosed with autism, which puts it at a rate of 2.8%. The average age of diagnosis is 14.3 years. In a statement about the study, the team explained:
“These findings indicate that the male to female ratio for autism has decreased over time and with increasing age at diagnosis. This male to female ratio may therefore be substantially lower than previously thought, to the extent that, in Sweden, it may no longer be distinguishable by adulthood. These observations highlight the need to investigate why female individuals receive diagnoses later than male individuals.”
Understanding that there is a tendency for females to have their symptoms missed for much longer than males should be a wakeup call for doctors and parents. Anne Cary is a patient advocate, and wrote an editorial about this, saying about females:
“they are likely to be (mis)diagnosed with psychiatric conditions, especially mood and personality disorders, and they are forced to self-advocate to be seen and treated appropriately: as autistic patients, just as autistic as their male counterparts.”
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If steps can be taken to provide earlier diagnosis for females, it will help them to get the treatment they need to better adapt to live as normal of lives as possible. Of course, more accurate diagnostics can also help future researchers to better identify potential causes of autism so that it can be avoided, or even treated.
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