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Updated: Jun 3, 2025
Clinical Practice Protocol of Creative Music Therapy for Preterm Infants and Their Parents in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit
Published on: January 7, 2020
Neonatal and Home-Based PT Improves Neurodevelopmental Outcomes of Preterm Infants-A Randomized Clinical Trial
Sonia Khurana1, Leslie E Lewis, Daniel M Russell
1Department of Physical Therapy, Ellmer College of Health Sciences, Macon & Joan Brock Virginia Health Sciences, Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia (Dr Khurana); Department of Pediatrics, Kasturba Medical College, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal, India (Dr Lewis); School of Exercise Science, Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia (Dr Russell); Sykes Chair of Pediatric Physical Therapy, Health, and Development, University of Southern California, Division of Biokinesiology and Physical Therapy, Los Angeles, California (Dr Dusing); Department of Physiotherapy, Manipal College of Health Professions, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal, India (Dr Krishna Rao).
Purpose:
Investigate the effect of structured neonatal physical therapy program (SNP) on neurodevelopmental outcomes of moderate and late preterm (MLP) infants.
Methods:
Sixty MLP infants were randomly allocated to usual care (UC) or SNP. A previous publication reported the effect of neonatal component of SNP at hospital discharge. This paper examined SNP's effect on motor, cognitive and language outcomes at 3 and 6 months using a 2-way mixed design ANOVA.
Results:
Both groups were similar at baseline for motor scores. Infants receiving SNP significantly outperformed UC at all subsequent time points. At 3 and 6 months, SNP significantly outscored UC in cognitive and language outcomes.
Conclusion:
SNP is effective in improving neurodevelopmental outcomes of MLP infants. However, caution is suggested in interpreting its effect on cognition and language as we lacked baseline scores to compare the longitudinal trajectory.
