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Sensory-motor performance in seven-year-old children born extremely preterm

Piia Lönnberg1, Ulla Niutanen1, L Diane Parham2

  • 1Children's Hospital, Pediatric Research Center, University of Helsinki and Helsinki University Hospital, Helsinki, Finland.

Early Human Development
|April 1, 2018
PubMed

Insights

Children born extremely preterm often have sensory processing and motor skill deficits. At seven years old, they performed significantly worse than peers born at term in multiple developmental assessments.

Area of Science:

  • Developmental Pediatrics
  • Neuroscience
  • Child Psychology

Background:

  • Children born preterm are at higher risk for motor impairments.
  • Sensory processing in preterm children is under-researched.
  • Early motor development is crucial for overall child development.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate sensory-motor performance in children born extremely preterm (EPT).
  • To compare the sensory-motor skills of EPT children with term-born children at age seven.
  • To identify specific areas of dysfunction in EPT children's sensory processing and motor skills.

Main Methods:

  • A longitudinal prospective cohort study design was employed.
  • 49 extremely preterm children (born <28 weeks gestation) and 33 term-born children were assessed.
  • Six subtests from the Sensory Integration and Praxis Tests were administered at 7.0–7.3 years of age.

Main Results:

  • Extremely preterm children showed a higher rate of dysfunction across all tested sensory-motor subtests compared to term-born children.
  • EPT children performed significantly worse in Design Copying, Motor Accuracy, Postural Praxis, and Finger Identification.
  • Manual Form Perception deficits in EPT children were no longer significant after adjusting for Full-Scale Intelligence Quotient.

Conclusions:

  • Seven-year-old children born extremely preterm exhibit poorer visual-motor, somatosensory, and motor planning abilities compared to term-born children.
  • These findings highlight persistent sensory-motor challenges in EPT populations.
  • Early identification and intervention for sensory-motor deficits in EPT children are warranted.
Abstract

Keywords:
ChildrenExtremely pretermSensory-motorSomatosensoryVisual-motor

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