Autism spectrum disorders in Iraq : a review of literature

Abstract EN

Objective: The term of Autism (which is recently called as autism spectrum disorders-ASD) became a subject of concern in the Arab world especially during the last 25 years.

The authors have previously published several articles about autism in the Arab societies (including Iraq) in which a general handling of this condition was shown, but they found that the works are little and not characterized.

There were no previous review articles that have been discussed on the ASD in Iraq.

In the most reports data are discussed from each governorate in Iraq separately, which provide a major obstacle to obtain administration of services properly to those children in this country.

The goals of this work were to: (1) concentrate on the volume of this issue; (2) identification of the research performed in this project; and (3) focus on the services given for these cases and for members of their families.

Methods: A review of the published works in Iraqi Academic Scientific Journals (IASJ) according to the keywords: “autism”, “Autism spectrum disorders-ASD”.

Authors independently analyzed selectively the data of reports by extracted from the site of IASJ in which including the title of the article, date of their publishing, place of study, scope of study, number of cases enrolled, and major results.

Results: Information from reports performed by different governorates on spectrum of topics in ASD researches including clinical studies, genetics, immunologic, biochemical, nutrition, metabolic errors, radiologic, management, and availability ofservices for autistic cases, were collected and reviewed.

Throughout a period from 2011 to 2017, 23 articles were conducted in Iraq, the majority of these publications were in the last four years.

Most of them analyzed the possible cause of this disease.

Clinical studies represented the frequent one (n=9), while that which discussed on the molecular aspect constituted the most addressed topic in 2017.

Four articles on oral health.

On the other hand, immune theory was one of topics investigated in Iraq (n=2).

To our best knowledge, no review articles nor that addressed on treatment outcome.

Conclusions: A raising concern of autistic cases in Iraq was shown, markedly in Baghdad, with an evidence of increasing in the rate of researches on this topic in the last few years especially for the molecular aspect.

Works on ASD in Iraq still in its early period and there is a need for organized efforts to be beneficial.

More researches are essential to characterize effectively the suitable ways to improve the diagnosis and services in the context in Iraq from cultural view and that concerning the structure of governments.