Description:
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<jats:title>CONTEXT:</jats:title>
<jats:p>Dietary interventions such as restrictive diets or supplements are common treatments for young people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Evidence for the efficacy of these interventions is still controversial.</jats:p>
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<jats:title>OBJECTIVE:</jats:title>
<jats:p>To assess the efficacy of specific dietary interventions on symptoms, functions, and clinical domains in subjects with ASD by using a meta-analytic approach.</jats:p>
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<jats:title>DATA SOURCES:</jats:title>
<jats:p>Ovid Medline, PsycINFO, Embase databases.</jats:p>
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<jats:title>STUDY SELECTION:</jats:title>
<jats:p>We selected placebo-controlled, double-blind, randomized clinical trials assessing the efficacy of dietary interventions in ASD published from database inception through September 2017.</jats:p>
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<jats:title>DATA EXTRACTION:</jats:title>
<jats:p>Outcome variables were subsumed under 4 clinical domains and 17 symptoms and/or functions groups. Hedges’ adjusted g values were used as estimates of the effect size of each dietary intervention relative to placebo.</jats:p>
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<jats:title>RESULTS:</jats:title>
<jats:p>In this meta-analysis, we examined 27 double-blind, randomized clinical trials, including 1028 patients with ASD: 542 in the intervention arms and 486 in the placebo arms. Participant-weighted average age was 7.1 years. Participant-weighted average intervention duration was 10.6 weeks. Dietary supplementation (including omega-3, vitamin supplementation, and/or other supplementation), omega-3 supplementation, and vitamin supplementation were more efficacious than the placebo at improving several symptoms, functions, and clinical domains. Effect sizes were small (mean Hedges’ g for significant analyses was 0.31), with low statistical heterogeneity and low risk of publication bias.</jats:p>
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<jats:title>LIMITATIONS:</jats:title>
<jats:p>Methodologic heterogeneity among the studies in terms of the intervention, clinical measures and outcomes, and sample characteristics.</jats:p>
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<jats:title>CONCLUSIONS:</jats:title>
<jats:p>This meta-analysis does not support nonspecific dietary interventions as treatment of ASD but suggests a potential role for some specific dietary interventions in the management of some symptoms, functions, and clinical domains in patients with ASD.</jats:p>
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