Motor, language and cognitive skills in preterm and full term children between the ages of two and three years

Abstract

According to the World Health Organization (1) set up as newly born preterm, or premature babies those with gestational age below 37 weeks and low birth weight children, as all those born alive with birth weights below 2,500 grams at birth. Prematurity is considered a biological risk factor for the typical child development. Permeating the hypothesis that exposure to intercurrence of prematurity may lead to developmental disorders, this important condition in the early stages of development when the brain is immature, turning the children vulnerable to events interfering in the processes of skill acquisition, The aim of this study is to compare the performance of children born prematurely typical aged between two and three years on the motor performance, language and cognitive and to characterize the performance of receptive and expressive language between the groups. After completion of the ethical aspects will be evaluated 20 children with low weight and prematurity (PBP), 20 children with extreme prematurity and low birth weight (PMBP) and 40 term born children with typical development matched according to age and sex. An initial interview will be accomplished with the responsible of the children and it will be applied the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventories: First words and gestures. The evaluation will be composed by Communicative Behavior Observation; application of the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test, Child Language Test ABFW - Vocabulary and Denver II Developmental Screening Test. Psychological evaluation will be accomplished with the application of the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scales. Order to the testing procedures will follow the norms provided for in the handbooks for each instrument. The evaluations will be recorded for later analysis. Statistical analysis will consist of the application of different tests, depending on the quality of the variables. Thus, will use the following instruments: "t" Studant, Mann-Whitney; Paired "t" test; Spearman correlation coefficient and Wilcoxon. (AU)