Sensing Echoes: Temporal Misalignment in Auditory Brainstem Responses as the Earliest Marker of Neurodevelopmental Derailment

Abstract

AbstractNeurodevelopmental disorders are on the rise worldwide, with diagnoses that detect derailment from typical milestones by 3-4.5 years of age. By then, the circuitry in the brain has already reached some level of maturation that inevitably takes neurodevelopment through a different course. There is a critical need then to develop analytical methods that detect problems much earlier and identify targets for treatment. We integrate data from multiple sources, including neonatal auditory brainstem responses (ABR), clinical criteria detecting autism years later in those neonates, and similar ABR information for young infants and children who also received a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorders, to produce the earliest known digital screening biomarker to flag neurodevelopmental derailment in neonates. This work also defines concrete targets for treatment and offers a new statistical approach to aid in guiding a personalized course of maturation in line with the highly nonlinear, accelerated neurodevelopmental rates of change in early infancy.Significance StatementAutism is currently detected on average after 4.5 years of age, based on differences in social interactions. Yet basic building blocks that develop to scaffold social interactions are present at birth and quantifiable at clinics. Auditory Brainstem Response tests, routinely given to neonates, infants, and young children, contain information about delays in signal transmission important for sensory integration. Although currently discarded as gross data under traditional statistical approaches, new analytics reveal unambiguous differences in ABR signals’ fluctuations between typically developing neonates and those who received an autism diagnosis. With very little effort and cost, these new analytics could be added to the clinical routine testing of neonates to create a universal screening tool for neurodevelopmental derailment and prodrome of autism.