Other Pioneers of Early Thinking on Kids with Down syndrome and autism

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Although autism is a relatively rare occurrence in people with Down syndrome,

there are an increasing number of reports of the two conditions co-existing.

Wing and Gould (1979) carried out an epidemiological study of 35,000 children

under the age of 15 years, using the Medical Research Council's Handicaps,

Behaviour and Skills (HBS) interview schedule (Wing and Gould 1978). They

initially reported one child from a total of 30 fully ambulant children who met

two essential criteria for typical autism (Kanner and Eisenberg 1956) and

another two children who were severely socially impaired, mute, with no pretend

play and marked motor stereotypies. Although these two were within the autistic

spectrum, they were not classified as having Kanner's autism because they showed

no adherence to elaborate non-functional routines other than their motor

stereotypies. At follow-up, it was clear that one more child with Down syndrome

should have been included in the socially impaired but not typically autistic

group (Kanner, personal communication). Turk (1992), also using the HBS

schedule, reported that 9 per cent of his series of children with Down syndrome

met the full ICD-10 criteria for autism (World Health Organization 1993).

Ghaziuddin (personal communication) found autism in 10 per cent of his subjects

with Downs' syndrome. Gillberg (1986) identified or child with 'classic' autism

from a group of 20 children with Down syndrome Ghaziuddin et al. (1992) found

two children who fulfilled DSM III-R criteria fit autism (American Psychiatric

Association 1987) from an estimated total of 40 with Down syndrome (based on

school-age population figures). Lund (1988), in a Danish epidemiologies study of

44 adults with Down syndrome diagnosed four males and one female a, having

autism, again using the HBS questionnaire (Wing and Gould 1978).