Autism Spectrum Disorder in People living with Chronic pain
| Key things to know | What the evidence shows |
|---|---|
| How common is it? | Not established ASD-among-chronic-pain pooled estimate |
| Is it more common among people living with chronic pain? | Chronic pain occurs meaningfully among autistic people; evidence does not support one universal prevalence figure yet |
| Are people living with chronic pain at higher risk? | Yes for pain difficulties within autism, direction mostly autism → pain research |
| How much higher is the risk? | Not established clean pooled figure |
| How often can it be missed? | High, because atypical pain communication/assessment can obscure both pain and autism |
| Does it show up differently among people living with chronic pain? | Strong Yes contextually |
| How might it look different? | Pain expression/interoception and clinician interpretation may differ; abdominal pain and headache/migraine frequently studied |
| What commonly occurs alongside it? | Migraine/headache; gastrointestinal conditions; anxiety/depression |
| What can it be confused with? | Somatic symptom disorder; migraine; fibromyalgia; anxiety |
| Common screening tool | AQ-10 |
| Separate screening tool for people living with chronic pain | None |
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