Autism Diagnosis Explained: DSM-5 Criteria, Autistic Traits & the Difficult Differential

That brings us, I think, to our topic today, which is autism spectrum disorders.

You know, we've had some requests for autism as a topic of an episode.

And initially I thought to myself, who am I to talk about autism? Do I really know anything about it? I'm not a child psychiatrist.

But then I kind of thought about it, and I realized, just like the line from the first Tobey Maguire Spider-Man movie, perhaps I am something of an autism expert myself.

And what do I mean by that? I'm not saying that I would say that in the court of law.

I'm not saying that I've had any formal supervision or training in this.

But my patient population is probably way more over-represented than...

in neurodevelopmental disorders, especially intellectual disability and autism, usually moderate to severe, but not just, than probably most psychiatrists.

I mean, what percent of the patient panel do you think most psychiatrists would see autism spectrum disorder? Incredibly tiny.

It's a very, very small percentage

out here.

Yeah, I polled a lot of my outpatient, inpatient colleagues.

I think I do see more than average.

I think it has to be minimum five, 10% of the population that I'm seeing has autism with or without comorbidities.

So I actually see quite a lot and I have been for many years.

So I guess based on that, I might be able to say something about it.

And, you know, take what I say with a grain of salt, I suppose.

That's what I'm saying before we get into this.

So, Dr. Fu, I have to admit something.

We talked before.

You mentioned your opener was going to have to do something with that.

You know, I'm something of a scientist myself.

I thought you were alluding to the fact that you actually have autistic traits.

And you were saying, you know, I'm something of autism spectrum myself.

Well, that may have been your wish, Dr. Malisberg, may have been your wish or perhaps your projection.