Is there a link between epidurals and later autism diagnosis?

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2021-09-29 01:00

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While a group of international researchers have found a small increased risk of autism diagnosis in children after an epidural during childbirth, a second study on the topic has not replicated this finding. In the first paper, researchers looked at birth data and autism diagnosis data for about 390,000 children, and found while 1.53 per cent of children exposed to an epidural during birth were diagnosed with autism, 1.26 per cent of those not exposed to an epidural were diagnosed with autism. The researchers say this difference does not provide strong evidence of a link between epidurals and autism. In the second paper, researchers performed a similar study with 480,000 children in Denmark, and they say they found no significant association between epidurals and later autism diagnosis.

News release

From: JAMA

(Paper 2) What The Study Did: Administration of epidural analgesia during labor was not significantly associated with autism spectrum disorder in offspring in this study of Danish children.

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Research JAMA, Web page Paper 1 - The URL will go live after the embargo ends

Research JAMA, Web page Paper 2 - The URL will go live after the embargo ends

Journal/
conference: JAMA

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: Paper 1: University of British Columbia, Canada, Paper 2: Copenhagen University Hospital–Rigshospitalet, Denmark

Funder: Paper 1: This study was funded by an operating grant from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and was funded by the Sunny Hill Foundation for Children (part of the BC Children’s Hospital Foundation). Dr Hanley’s work was funded by a new investigator award from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and a scholar award from the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research. Paper 2: This investigation was funded by grant E-22515-01 from The Research Fund of Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen University Hospital.

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