App to identify autistic children in India

Children with autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders in India can be successfully identified by community healthcare workers using a low-cost app, a study has found.

The results, published in Autism, could open the door to help millions of children with autism spectrum conditions to get earlier screening quickly and inexpensively, leading to life-changing support.

Researchers from India, the UK, and the US tested the app with 131 two- to seven-year-olds living in low-resource neighborhoods of Delhi, India.

The tests were carried out at the homes of the children, by non-specialist healthcare workers, educated to high school level, using the research team’s app, called START (Screening Tools for Autism Risk using Technology).

Through a series of simple games, questions, images, and activities on a tablet computer – such as popping bubbles and looking at patterns and images – the app measured the social preference, sensory interests, and motor skills of the children.

Reference: Using mobile health technology to assess childhood autism in low-resource community settings in India: An innovation to address the detection gap, Autism, DOI 10.1177/13623613231182801