Perspective Biological Markers for Autism Spectrum Disorders: Advantages of the Use of Receiver Operating Characteristic Curves in Evaluating Marker Sensitivity and Specificity

Table 5

Metabolites. AUC: Area Under the Curve; ASD: Autistic Spectrum Disorder; HC: healthy controls; SD: standard deviation; na: data not available; and CI: confidence interval.

Lab test

Increase

Decrease

values

Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC)

Diagnosis

Age (Y): range (mean ± SD)

Number; M/F

Control group

Country

Biologic sample

Technique

Reference

Cut-off values

Sensitivity

Specificity

AUC

Pentacarboxyl (penta-) porphyrins; (nmol/gCr)

<0.006

2.1

30% for AUT; 36% for PDD-NOS

94%

Autism and PDD-NOS

2.5–12.4 (6.64 ± 2.59)

30 male with AUT; 14 male with PDD-NOS

HC

USA (Washington, Oregon)

Urine

HPLC and spectrofluorometry

[49]

Coproporphyrins; (nmol/gCr)

<0.006

108

33% for AUT; 14% for PDD-NOS

94%

The combined score measure; (-penta + -copro)

1.13

33% for AUT; 21% for PDD-NOS

100%

Methoxyphenyl oxime; (volatile organic compounds)

<0.0001

na

na

na

0.76–0.99; 95% CI

Autism

(6.9 ± 2.1)

22/2

HC

Italy

Urine

Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry

[50]

Succinate; orthogonal partial least-squares discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA) scores

<0.001

100%

100%

0.92

Autism

6–14 (mean: 8)

24/6

HC

France

Urine

1H-NMR spectroscopy; 1H-13C heteronuclear single quantum coherence (HSQC) NMR

[51]

Glutamate

<0.05

3-Methyl-histidine

<0.05