Costs of autism spectrum disorders in the United Kingdom and the United States.

By A. Buescher, Zuleyha Cidav, Martin Knapp, D. Mandell. JAMA pediatrics, 2014

1,241 citations recorded by the source corpus.

IMPORTANCE The economic effect of autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) on individuals with the disorder, their families, and society as a whole is poorly understood and has not been updated in light of recent findings. OBJECTIVE To update estimates of age-specific, direct, indirect, and lifetime societal economic costs, including new findings on indirect costs, such as individual and parental productivity costs, associated with ASDs. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS A literature review was conducted of US and UK studies on individuals with ASDs and their families in October 2013 using the following keywords: age, autism spectrum disorder, prevalence, accommodation, special education, productivity loss, employment, costs, and economics. Current data on prevalence, level of functioning, and place of residence were combined with mean annual costs of services and support, opportunity costs, and productivity losses of individuals with ASDs with or without intellectual disability. EXPOSURE Presence of ASDs. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES Mean annual medical, nonmedical, and indirect economic costs and lifetime costs were measured for individuals with ASDs separately for individuals with and without intellectual disability in the United States and the United Kingdom. RESULTS The cost of supporting an individual with an ASD and intellectual disability during his or her lifespan was $2.4 million in the United States and £1.5 million (US $2.2 million) in the United Kingdom. The cost of supporting an individual with an ASD without intellectual disability was $1.4 million in the United States and £0.92 million (US $1.4 million) in the United Kingdom. The largest cost components for children were special education services and parental productivity loss. During adulthood, residential care or supportive living accommodation and individual productivity loss contributed the highest costs. Medical costs were much higher for adults than for children. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE The substantial direct and indirect economic effect of ASDs emphasizes the need to continue to search for effective interventions that make best use of scarce societal resources. The distribution of economic effect across many different service systems raises questions about coordination of services and sectors. The enormous effect on families also warrants policy attention.

Subfields: Clinical Psychology, Cognitive Neuroscience, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/11cc52cbcb72fee5d8a917312fe961964ab8f3b5

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Clinical Psychology

1. Meng-Chuan Lai
2. Simon Baron-Cohen
3. Jean Decety
4. Adam Smith
5. M. Ruby
6. Yael Kimhi

In Cognitive Neuroscience

1. Meng-Chuan Lai
2. Michael V. Lombardo
3. Simon Baron-Cohen
4. Sally J. Wheelwright
5. Daniel Nettle
6. Adam Smith
7. Jean Decety
8. Yael Kimhi

Citations in the corpus

• Big data approaches to decomposing heterogeneity across the autism spectrum (2018, background): “population costs are around $268 billion in the United States [2, 3].”
• The Changing Epidemiology of Autism Spectrum Disorders (2016, background): “5 million range (estimates in 2012 US dollars) (25).”
• Autism and ABA: The Gulf Between North America and Europe (2015, background): “1 billion per year in the UK, more than heart disease, stroke and cancer combined (Buescher et al. 2014).”