Cognitive Functions and Health Related Quality of Life of Institutional Autism Spectrum Disorder Children in Dhaka city

The objective of the study was to measure HRQoL and cognitive functioning in a group of autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) children and to relate HRQoL with their socio demographic characteristics and cognitive functioning from parents ’ perception.This cross sectional study was conducted among149 purposively selected parents who have institutionalized autistic children (2 to 18 years old) from January to June 2013. HRQoL was assessed by Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory 4.0 (Verni1998) and cognitive functioning was assessed with The PedsQL TM Cognitive Functioning Scale.Three fourth of the children were male (n=115, 77.2%) and the mean (SD) age of the children was 7.8(3.06) years. Symptoms of autism appeared at about their 2nd birthday 2.1 (.70) while the average (SD) age of diagnosis was around three years 2.9 (.98). The children were reported to go to school at an early age of 3(1.75) years. Out of 149 respondents, ten percent parents (n=14) had the history of consanguineous marriage.The sample data provides significant difference between the scores by the ability of verbal communication (p<.05), presence of autistic siblings (p<.05) and mother ’s occupation (p<.05). There found negative correlation between HRQoL and age of symptom appearance and cognitive functioning with age of diagnosis (r = - 0.18; p=.03). Cognitive functioning was strongly correlated with total PedsQL score and its domains (r = 0.73; p=.00). i.e. Higher cognitive function leads to good heal...
Source: Bangladesh Medical Research Council Bulletin - Category: Global & Universal Source Type: research