MRI for autism diagnosis?

I've been reading about how there was a study that could diagnose autism using MRI scans of the brain. This doesn't seem to be part of the normal diagnosis process yet. (?)

I had an MRI aout 10 years ago, long before I ever thought about autism. The clinic still has my scans. Is it worth requesting them to be posted to me? Is there any point? I have my second assessment appointment next week.

Parents
  • I've been reading about how there was a study that could diagnose autism using MRI scans of the brain.

    I don't think this method has been shown to be infallible, as some who are autistic have not been shown to exhibit the brain characteristics on an MRI scan, and others who are not autistic do exhibit the brain scan characteristics.

    But it is probably a good start.  I too had an MRI scan, in my case after a knock to the head.  I was not told if it showed anything untoward in any way, they must have seen something though because I was retained in hospital for observation afterwards.  But autism was not mentioned by either me or them (although at that time I did suspect I was autistic due to a very high score in an AQ test.

    There is no 'proof' of autism from the scans to my understanding.  The correlation is being investigated, so as such I do not know whether it would be of use but they may not be since investigation into this is continuing

Reply
  • I've been reading about how there was a study that could diagnose autism using MRI scans of the brain.

    I don't think this method has been shown to be infallible, as some who are autistic have not been shown to exhibit the brain characteristics on an MRI scan, and others who are not autistic do exhibit the brain scan characteristics.

    But it is probably a good start.  I too had an MRI scan, in my case after a knock to the head.  I was not told if it showed anything untoward in any way, they must have seen something though because I was retained in hospital for observation afterwards.  But autism was not mentioned by either me or them (although at that time I did suspect I was autistic due to a very high score in an AQ test.

    There is no 'proof' of autism from the scans to my understanding.  The correlation is being investigated, so as such I do not know whether it would be of use but they may not be since investigation into this is continuing

Children
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