Doctor's diary: Why do people with autism die so young? - The Telegraph
Quote:
Her team found that the mean age of death of somebody with autism was 54 – compared with 70 for the general population. For people with autism and a learning disability, life expectancy was a mere 40 years
Quote:
For those with an associated learning disability, the leading cause is epilepsy: this kills people with autism at a rate 40 times that of the general population. For people with autism who do not have a learning disability, the key factor is suicide, for which the rate is nine times greater.
People with autism are also at greater risk from a wide range of physical illnesses, including heart disease and cancers. It remains unclear whether they are more susceptible to these conditions, or they suffer from a lack of awareness of these problems among health professionals, resulting in delays and inadequacies in diagnosis and treatment.
I think part of the problem is the consequences just bieng an outlier, thinking and acting differently then most people. Stress and continiual negative reinforcement are well known to lower life expectancy. That this rather obvious possible factor is appearently not even bieng thought of demonstrates the problem.
On a personal note I have lasted longer then the life expentancy for HFA's. But after crusing through life relatively unscathed, bad health issues have happened in the last year. I am not in the known risk group for the type of cancer I have been dealing with. It does make me wonder, but there is no way to know for sure.
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Professionally Identified and joined WP August 26, 2013
DSM 5: Autism Spectrum Disorder, DSM IV: Aspergers Moderate Severity
It is Autism Acceptance Month
“My autism is not a superpower. It also isn’t some kind of god-forsaken, endless fountain of suffering inflicted on my family. It’s just part of who I am as a person”. - Sara Luterman
13 Mar 2016, 1:43 am
