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Is Infertility Associated with Childhood Autism?

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Abstract

Concerns persist about a possible link between infertility and risk of autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Interpretation of existing studies is limited by racial/ethnic homogeneity of study populations and other factors. Using a case–control design, we evaluated infertility history and treatment documented in medical records of members of Kaiser Permanente Northern California. Among singletons (349 cases, 1,847 controls), we found no evidence to support an increase in risk of ASD associated with infertility. Among multiple births (21 cases, 54 controls), we found an increased risk associated with infertility history and with infertility evaluations and treatment around the time of index pregnancy conception; however, small sample size and lack of detailed data on treatments preclude firm interpretation of results for multiple births.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Daniel Najjar, MS, for assistance with data management and analysis, Bruce Fireman, MA, and Karin B. Nelson, MD, for their careful review and valuable input to an earlier version of this manuscript. This study was supported in part by Cooperative Agreement Number U10/CCU920392 from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention and in part by National Cancer Institute (1-RO1-CA-69619) and National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (1-P01-HD37074) (Mary Croughan, Ph.D., Principal Investigator). The contents of the paper are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the funding agencies.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. California Department of Public Health, Environmental Health Investigations Branch, Richmond, CA, 94804, USA

    Judith K. Grether

  2. Division of Research, Kaiser Foundation Research Institute, Kaiser Permanente, 2000 Broadway, Oakland, CA, 94612, USA

    Yinge Qian & Lisa A. Croen

  3. Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences, University of California, San Francisco, CA, 94143, USA

    Mary S. Croughan & Michael Schembri

  4. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, University of California, San Francisco, CA, 94143, USA

    Mary S. Croughan

  5. Department of Neurology, University of California, San Francisco, CA, 94143, USA

    Yvonne W. Wu

  6. Department of Pediatrics, University of California, San Francisco, CA, 94143, USA

    Yvonne W. Wu

  7. School of Nursing, Samuel Merritt University, San Mateo, CA, 94402, USA

    Loretta Camarano

Authors
  1. Judith K. Grether
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  2. Yinge Qian
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  3. Mary S. Croughan
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  4. Yvonne W. Wu
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  5. Michael Schembri
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  6. Loretta Camarano
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  7. Lisa A. Croen
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Correspondence to Lisa A. Croen.

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Grether, J.K., Qian, Y., Croughan, M.S. et al. Is Infertility Associated with Childhood Autism?. J Autism Dev Disord 43, 663–672 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-012-1598-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-012-1598-5

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