Autism is a PATIENT DIAGNOSIS.

Autism is defined as a lifelong condition that affects how a PERSON communicates with, and relates to, other people. Autism also affects how a PERSON makes sense of the world around them.

A PATIENT DIAGNOSIS of Autism may result in the PATIENT having a DISABILITY.

The three main areas of difficulty, which all people with Autism share, are known as the 'triad of impairments'. They are:

• difficulty with social communication (e.g. problems using and understanding verbal and non-verbal language, such as gestures, facial expressions and tone of voice)
• difficulty with social interaction (e.g. problems in recognising and understanding other people's feelings and managing their own feelings)
• difficulty with social imagination (e.g. problems in understanding and predicting other people's intentions and behaviour and imagining situations outside their own routine).

For further information on Autism, see the:

• National Autistic Society website at: What is autism?
• NHS website at: Autism.

This supporting information is also known by these names:

Context	Alias
formerly	Autistic Spectrum Disorder
alsoknownas	Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD)