{"id":219138,"date":"2024-10-17T00:00:59","date_gmt":"2024-10-17T04:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/?p=219138"},"modified":"2024-10-18T14:40:09","modified_gmt":"2024-10-18T18:40:09","slug":"new-catalog-charts-familial-ties-from-autism-to-90-other-conditions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/spectrum\/new-catalog-charts-familial-ties-from-autism-to-90-other-conditions\/","title":{"rendered":"New catalog charts familial ties from autism to 90 other conditions"},"content":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The research tool reveals associations stretching across three generations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":219140,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":""},"categories":[152],"tags":[135,17,136,76,79,45,298,53,133,134,714,715,137,581,197],"acf":{"primary_tag":197,"doi_url":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.53053\/VFQA5747","custom_js_library":"","hero_type":"feat_image","hero_alt_image":null,"hero_youtube":"","hero_video":null,"hero_layout":"full","hero_caption":"Passed down:<\/b> The resource reveals an association between autism and grandparents with cardiometabolic conditions, among other links that researchers may follow up on. ","hero_by":"","hero_credit":"","hero_bg_color":"none","authors":[107200],"other_authors":"","related_title":"Explore more from The Transmitter<\/em>","related_hide":false,"related_filter":"latest","related_tag":null,"related_category":null,"related_custom":{"articles":null},"recommended_title":"Recommended reading","recommended_hide":false,"recommended_filter":"latest","recommended_tag":null,"recommended_category":null,"recommended_custom":{"articles":null},"comps":[{"acf_fc_layout":"copy_comp","copy":"A new open-source catalog now identifies associations between autism and family histories of dozens of conditions.\r\n\r\n\u201cIf you\u2019re interested in whether a particular condition is associated with autism, you can use our map to help generate study questions,\u201d says lead investigator Diana Schendel<\/a>, a professor and leader of the Research Program in Modifiable Factors in Autism at Drexel University in Philadelphia. \u201cOr, if you have some results, you can compare them to those from other studies.\u201d\r\n\r\nMany studies have uncovered genes associated with autism\u2014but family history can be important to explore as well. For example, when it comes to predicting the likelihood of complex conditions such as schizophrenia<\/a> and coronary artery disease<\/a>, accounting for both of these factors proves more helpful than relying on just genes alone, previous work suggests.\r\n\r\n[tt_sidebar_quote author='Diana Schendel']If you\u2019re interested in whether a particular condition is associated with autism, you can use our map to help generate study questions.[\/tt_sidebar_quote]\r\n\r\nThis led Schendel and her colleagues to lay the groundwork for a similar investigation in autism. \u201cFamily histories may show us the effects of genes linked with autism that we don\u2019t know about yet, or non-genetic components associated with autism,\u201d Schendel says.\r\n\r\nThe new resource catalogued all live births in Denmark from 1980 to 2012\u2014nearly 1.7 million people. For each person, Schendel and her colleagues used Danish health registries to analyze up to 20 types of family members across three generations, tracking 90 diagnoses of mental and non-mental conditions until 2017, including asthma, allergies and neurologic, cardiometabolic, congenital and autoimmune conditions.\r\n\r\n\u201cMany previous studies have looked at family histories regarding a few conditions, such as ADHD, or a few types of family members, such as parents, or siblings with autism,\u201d Schendel says. \u201cWe wanted a wider perspective to help reveal patterns to better understand the origins of neurodiversity.\u201d\r\n\r\n[tt_text class='']F[\/tt_text]or the 26,840 autistic people in the dataset, the researchers collected more than 6,400 family histories and calculated the likelihood that these people had a family member with another condition compared with the likelihood for non-autistic people. The catalog<\/a> debuted 16 September in Autism Research<\/em>, along with an interactive risk atlas<\/a> and graphic summaries<\/a>.\r\n\r\nSeveral links they identified might spur follow-up research, including an association between autism and grandparents with cardiometabolic conditions. This suggests the possibility of a genetic link or of lifestyle features shared across generations that could influence prenatal factors connected with autism, Schendel and her colleagues write in their paper.\r\n\r\nIn addition, the association between autism and neurological, cardiometabolic, congenital or autoimmune disorders is greater for mothers than for fathers, they found. Similar results emerged for maternal half-siblings compared with paternal ones. This may highlight the way in which maternal prenatal conditions may influence a wide range of developmental outcomes.\r\n\r\nFurthermore, the catalog suggests birth defects are more common among males, but a greater likelihood of autism was associated with birth defects in female family members or on the maternal side of a family. The researchers say this sex-related difference may warrant further research.\r\n\r\n\u201cI wasn\u2019t expecting how often family histories of some conditions seem to play a role in the likelihood of someone getting an autism diagnosis,\u201d Schendel says. She and her colleagues plan to combine family history and genetic data in future autism studies, as well as to explore family history patterns they detected, such as potential links between cardiometabolic conditions and autism.\r\n\r\nDenmark\u2019s universal healthcare system let the researchers tap into decades-old databases. Schendel does think their research will generally translate to populations outside Denmark, although she notes in that places without complete healthcare coverage, gaps in medical data could lead to different results, \u201cespecially if the gaps are linked to certain groups of people and health conditions in particular.\u201d"},{"acf_fc_layout":"callout_comp","callout_title":"","callout_copy":"What patterns in family history and autism have you investigated in your research? Leave a comment below.","callout_color":"red"},{"acf_fc_layout":"newsletter","title":"","subtitle":"Sign up for the weekly Spectrum<\/em> newsletter to stay current with the latest advancements in autism research.","bg_image":200913,"groups":[{"group":"2","name":"","hide_checkbox":true}],"linktext":"","linkurl":""}]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219138"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219138"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219138\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":219227,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219138\/revisions\/219227"}],"acf:post":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor\/107200"}],"acf:term":[{"embeddable":true,"taxonomy":"post_tag","href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags\/197"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/219140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetransmitter.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}