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Autistic people are disproportionately likely to experience premature mortality and most mental and physical health conditions. We measured the incidence of diagnosed conditions accounting for the most disability-adjusted life years in the UK population according to the Global Burden of Disease study (anxiety, depression, self-harm, harmful alcohol use, substance use, migraine, neck or back pain, and gynaecological conditions).

Participants were aged 18 years or above and had an autism diagnosis recorded in the IQVIA Medical Research Database between 01/01/2000 and 16/01/2019. We included 15,675 autistic adults without intellectual disability, 6437 autistic adults with intellectual disability, and a comparison group matched (1:10) by age, sex, and primary care practice. We estimated crude incidences and incidence rate ratios (IRRs) adjusted for age and sex.

Autistic adults …