Very Preterm Birth is Associated with Disabilities in Multiple Developmental Domains

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Abstract
Objective Follow-up studies in very preterm children usually present outcome for separate developmental domains. Presence of disabilities in more than one developmental domain will show a more serious outcome picture for extreme preterm infants and may be related to a different degree of perinatal problems. Methods At 5.5 years corrected age, outcome in the neurological, motor, cognitive, and behavioral domain was studied in 157 children born Results Thirty-nine percent had a normal developmental outcome, 17% had a single disability, and 44% had multiple disabilities. Multiple disabilities were associated with lower birth weight, BPD, and difficulties according to neurodevelopmental assessments at 2 years. Conclusion Assessments of different developmental domains show that most very preterm children had multiple disabilities.