Simple eye movement test spots fetal alcohol spectrum disorders

Canadian researchers have found that simple eye movement tests can effectively diagnose fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) in children.

FASD is described as a syndrome of permanent birth defects caused by maternal consumption of alcohol during pregnancy.

FASD is more widespread and less severe than fetal alcohol syndrome, but FASD is apparently harder to diagnose because of a lack of objective diagnostic tools.

In order to find out whether the eye movements could be used to assess FASD in children, the research team from Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario compared the eye movements of 10 FASD affected children to those of 12 normal children.

The team led by James Reynolds and Doug Munoz found that children affected with FASD were more likely to make directional errors when instructed to look towards or away from a stimulus and took a longer reaction time, the time required to initiate eye movement, than the non FASD group.

Reynolds says this is the first time oculomotor tasks have been used to assess brain function in FASD children.

Reynolds says in the absence of confirmed maternal alcohol consumption during pregnancy, the diagnosis of FASD remains a significant clinical challenge.

Reynolds and his colleagues believe they have discovered what appears to be a powerful and yet easy tool for assessing children with FASD.

The research team has acquired a mobile eye-tracker unit that is allowing them to move their research out of the laboratory and into communities, where they plan to apply their findings to other developmental disorders, such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.

The study is published in the March issue of Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research.