Author: Laura Sanders / Source: Science News
Ultrasounds during pregnancy can be lots of fun, offering peeks at the baby-to-be. But ultrasounds aren’t just a way to get Facebook fodder.
They are medical procedures that involve sound waves, technology that could, in theory, affect a growing fetus.With that concern in mind, some researchers have wondered if the rising rates of autism diagnoses could have anything to do with the increasing number of ultrasound scans that women receive during pregnancy.
The answer is no, suggests a study published online February 12 in JAMA Pediatrics. On average, children with autism were exposed to fewer ultrasounds during pregnancy, scientists found. The results should be “very reassuring” to parents, says study coauthor Jodi Abbott, a maternal fetal medicine specialist at Boston Medical Center and Boston University School of Medicine.
To back up: Autism rates have risen sharply over the last several decades (though are possibly plateauing). Against this backdrop, researchers are searching for the causes of autism — and there are probably many. Autism is known to run in families, and scientists have found some of the particular genetic hot spots that may contribute. Other factors, such as older parents and maternal obesity, can also increase the risk of autism.
Scientists suspect that in many cases, autism is caused by many factors, all working together. Could prenatal ultrasounds, which have become more routine and more powerful, be one of those factors? These scans use sound waves that penetrate mothers’ bodies, and then collect the waves that bounce back, forming a picture of fetal tissues. During this process, the waves may be able to heat up the tissue they travel through.
Work on…
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