Autism and Asperger's vs. PDD-NOS

I found an interesting blog about autism a while back. It's on my list of web sites that I check frequently.

http://www.autismvox.com/

Mary was somewhat miffed when the psychiatrist diagnosed Don with PDD-NOS (Pervasive Developmental Delay - Not Otherwise Specified). He had already been diagnosed with Asperger's (high functioning autism) and a number of other things (atypical bipolar, night syndrome, and a few things that I haven't kept track of).

It didn't annoy me because I consider the whole psychology/sociology/anthropology spectrum of science disciplines to be anything but precise.

But still, PDD-NOS sounds to me like a fancy way of saying "We don't know". It's sort of like when you're sorting stuff into boxes, and you toss things that don't fit any of the categories into a box labeled "other".

The article supports that rather unscientific opinion of mine. Essentially, kids diagnosed with autism tend to keep the diagnosis. If they are diagnosed with PDD-NOS, the diagnosis may well change to autism later in life.