Characterizing Mental Health Symptoms and Caregiver Priorities for Autistic Children Receiving Publicly-Funded Mental Health Services: A Latent Class Analysis.

Background: Autistic children often receive publicly-funded mental health services to address co-occurring mental health concerns. Increasing research has sought to characterize the mental health profiles of autistic children accessing these services, but there remains a need to integrate caregiver priorities into these profiles. Objective: This study seeks to characterize autistic children's mental health profiles by integrating caregiver priorities and child mental health symptom severity. Method: Data from caregivers of 186 school-age autistic children were drawn from baseline assessments conducted in a hybrid type 3 implementation-effectiveness trial testing implementation strategies for Results: A four-class solution emerged: (1) Primarily Externalizing Priority, (2) Mixed Priority, Lower Severity, (3) Mixed Priority, Higher Severity, and (4) Primarily Internalizing Priority. Child gender and caregiver primary language were associated with class membership. Conclusion: Findings highlight the heterogeneity of autistic children's presenting problems and the value of integrating caregiver priorities into child profiles. Results may guide evidence-based intervention selection, implementation planning, and capacity building related to serving autistic children in mental health services.