International Journal of Emergency Mental Health and Human Resilience
Open Access

Short Communication

Autism Spectrum Disorder in the Emergency Department: Looking Beyond Behavior

Richard E Frye^1,2,*

¹Autism Research Program, Arkansas Children’s Hospital Research Institute, Little Rock, AR, USA

²Department of Pediatrics, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Little Rock, AR, USA

*Corresponding Author:

E-mail: REFrye@uams.edu

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a complex neurodevelopmental condition that is behaviorally defined by its well-recognized impairments in verbal and non-verbal communication and social interactions in addition to distinctive restrictive and repetitive behaviors (APA, 1994). Over the past decades the incidence of this disorder has dramatically increased. Although the reason or reasons for this increase is still up for debate, the fact remains that ASD is now estimated to affect 1 in 68 children in the United States (Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network Surveillance Year Principal, Centers for Disease, & Prevention, 2014)