Food variety as a predictor of nutritional status among children with autism

Due to repetitive and restricted dietary behaviours, ASD children are at increased risk of low dietary vitamin D intake.

“Moreover, due to repetitive and restricted dietary behaviours, ASD children are at increased risk of low dietary vitamin D intake [128,129].”

Children with ASD may receive less sunlight due to lower outdoor activity and have inadequate intake of vitamin D, i.e., reverse causality.

“Furthermore, children with ASD may receive less sunlight due to lower outdoor activity and have inadequate intake of vitamin D [114,118,126,127,128,129,130,131,132,133,134,135,136], i.e., reverse causality.”

Several case-control studies have shown that children with ASD have lower vitamin D intakes than typically developing controls.

“However, several case-control studies have shown that children with ASD have lower vitamin D intakes than typically developing controls [114,128,129,130].”

Daily vitamin D intake was 199 ± 176 IU and 320 ± 119 IU in ASD and typically developing children, respectively (p < 0.05).

“Daily vitamin D intake was 199 ± 176 IU and 320 ± 119 IU in ASD and typically developing children, respectively (p < 0.05) [129].”

More children with ASD did not meet the estimated average requirement (EAR) for vitamin D intake than healthy controls (79% vs. 55%, p = 0.01), and more selective eaters with ASD were at increased risk for inadequate intake (58% vs. 5%, p = 0.01).

“More children with ASD did not also meet the estimated average requirement (EAR) for vitamin D intake than healthy controls (79% vs. 55%, p = 0.01) [130], and more selective eaters with ASD were at increased risk for inadequate intake (58% vs. 5%, p = 0.01) [129].”

Emond et al. (2010) and Zimmer et al. (2012) reported that children with ASD had late introduction of solids after six months, were difficult to feed and very choosy from 15-54 months, had less varied diet from 24 months, and ate fewer food on average at older ages, all of which affected their nutritional status.

“Emond et al. (2010) and Zimmer et al. (2012) reported that children with ASD had late introduction of solids after six months, were difficult to feed and very choosy from 15–54 months, had less varied diet from 24 months, and ate fewer food on average at older ages, all of which affected their nutritional status [128,129].”

Both Emond and Zimmer studies showed that children with ASD had significantly lower dietary intakes of vitamin D than controls.

“Both studies showed that children with ASD had significantly lower dietary intakes of vitamin D than controls.”

Food variety is a predictor of nutritional status in children with ASD.

“Food variety has been shown to be a predictor of nutritional status of children with ASD [49].”

Protein intake in ASD children is adequate or quite similar to that of typically developing children.

“Protein intake was adequate or quite similar to that of typically developing children [69,72,73,74,75,76,77].”

A substantial number of subjects with ASDs had inadequate intakes of micronutrients, including deficiencies of calcium, iron, zinc, potassium, copper, vitamin A, vitamin D, vitamin E, riboflavin, vitamin C, vitamin B-12, folic acid, and choline.

“Substantial number of subjects with ASDs had inadequate intakes of micronutrients.”