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Quality of motor performance in preterm and full-term 3-year-old children
1Department of Women's and Children's Health, Section for Pediatrics, Uppsala University Children's Hospital, Uppsala, Sweden. elvira.hemgren@kbh.uu.se
Insights
Very preterm infants needing neonatal intensive care (NIC) show poorer motor skills at age 3. Early motor assessments effectively identify these subtle impairments in high-risk children.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Pediatrics
- Neonatal Follow-up
- Child Neurology
Background:
- A longitudinal study assessed motor performance and behavior (CAMPB) in children born very preterm, moderately preterm, and full-term, including a healthy full-term control group.
- The study focused on children requiring neonatal intensive care (NIC).
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the quality of motor performance at 3 years of age in preterm and full-term infants.
- To compare motor development across different gestational age groups and NIC status.
Main Methods:
- Utilized the Combined Assessment of Motor Performance and Behaviour (CAMPB) protocol for detailed motor and coordination assessments.
- Compared motor performance results between very preterm, moderately preterm, full-term NIC, and healthy full-term children.
Main Results:
- Very preterm infants exhibited significantly higher deviation scores compared to other groups.
- Specific motor deviations were more prevalent in very preterm children and those with pronounced incoordination.
- The two assessment methods showed a strong correlation.
Conclusions:
- At 3 years, neonatal intensive care (NIC) children born very preterm demonstrated lower motor performance quality than those born at higher gestational ages and healthy term infants.
- The assessment methods were effective in identifying children with minor motor impairments.
Background:
A combined assessment of motor performance and behaviour (CAMPB) was introduced previously for use in a longitudinal study of children who needed neonatal intensive care (NIC) and were born very preterm (n = 68), moderately preterm (n = 81) and full-term (n = 77) and in a reference group of neonatally healthy full-term children (n = 72). Aim To follow up the quality of motor performance at 3 years of age in the above groups of children.
Method:
A detailed assessment of motor performance and an assessment of co-ordination were performed according to the CAMPB protocol. The results were compared between the different groups of children, and the relation between the two ways of assessing quality of motor performance was examined.
Results:
The detailed assessment showed that the very preterm children had a significantly higher total score of deviations than any of the other gestational age groups of children. Also, some types of deviations were much more frequently observed in the very preterm children than in the other three groups. Some types of deviations were more often seen in children with pronounced incoordination than in children with no incoordination. The results from the two ways of assessing motor performance were strongly correlated.
Conclusion:
At 3 years of age, NIC children born very preterm have a lower quality of motor performance than NIC children born at a higher gestational age and healthy children born at term. The two ways of assessing quality of motor performance proved useful in identifying children with deviations indicating minor motor impairments.
