According to a study, children born prematurely are able to catch up to kids born at full term in their ability to identify things, by the age of 16. The results are a bit of a good news among myriad reports, detailing deficits in learning and cognition common among children born before due date.
Dr H Gerry Taylor, a professor of paediatrics at Case Western Reserve University, conducted a study along with many Canadian and US researchers. They compared more than 300 children born early and weighing less than those who were born after a full-length pregnancy of 37 weeks. At ages of eight, 12 and 16 years, the kids took several tests to measure their IQ and language skills. At each age, the premature children had IQs 15 to 17 points lower than their full-term counterparts. On tests of word knowledge and spatial reasoning, both groups of children improved in their skills over time, but the scores of the kids born early continued to lag by similar margins.
However, one examination — called Receptive Vocabulary, in which kids are shown asked to identify the correct picture for a given word — revealed a different pattern. At eight years, the premature kids scored 14 points lower on the vocabulary test than the other group but every four years, these children closed the gap by four points. Taylor said Premature children perform better on some tests and worse on others because the risk for brain damage is higher for some parts of the brain and lower for others. A preemie’s exposure to pain, oxygen and the environment can harm her immature brain.
“It’s amazing that even with these areas of difficulty the children are able to compensate quite well, make use of their strengths, and go on to achieve,” Taylor commented.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 22nd, 2011.
COMMENTS
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ