Which Perinatal risk factors are tied to developmental coordination disorder in extremely preterm infants?

These risk factors were frequent in children born extremely preterm contributing to their high developmental coordination disorder risk. The study findings appeared in the Acta Paediatrica journal.

Children born extremely preterm commonly have developmental coordination disorders. Jenny Bolk from Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden, and colleagues aimed to evaluate perinatal risk factors for DCD.

The Swedish national cohort study included 226 children born before 27 gestational weeks without significant neurodevelopmental disabilities at 6.5 years. Perinatal risk factors were assessed using multivariable logistic regression. The outcome was developmental coordination disorder, defined as ≤5th percentile on the Movement Assessment Battery for Children-Second Edition.

The authors reported the following findings:

• DCD was present in 37.2% of the children.
• Of the risk factors known at 40 weeks gestation, independent and significant risk factors for DCD were: preeclampsia (odd ratio [OR] 2.79); mother's age at delivery (1.73); mother born in a non-Nordic country (2.23); gestational per week increase (0.70) and retinopathy of prematurity (2.48).
• Of factors known at discharge, mechanical ventilation (1.76) and postnatal steroids exposure (2.24) were independent risk factors when added to the model in separate analyses.

"Developmental coordination disorder risk in children born extremely preterm was multifactorial and linked with gestational age largely mediated by maternal factors, ROP, mechanical ventilation, administration of postnatal steroids, and preeclampsia," the authors wrote in their study. "These risk factors are common in children born extremely preterm, leading to their high DCD risk."

About Developmental Coordination Disorder

Developmental coordination disorder, also called dyspraxia, is a condition that affects physical coordination. It reduces a child's performance in daily activities for their age, and they appear clumsy. The disorder is reported to be around 3 or 4 times more common among boys than girls, and sometimes it runs in families.

It delays the normal ability of children to achieve the milestones of standing, sitting up, talking, and walking at predictable ages.

Patients with DCD generally have normal intelligence. However, DCD, sometimes called "clumsy child syndrome", might cause others to think that people with this condition are unintelligent or inept because of their inability to perform basic tasks. This condition can be considered a childhood disorder, but the effects of DCD continue into adulthood.

Reference:

The study titled, "Perinatal risk factors for developmental coordination disorder in children born extremely preterm," was published in the journal Acta Paediatrica. 

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/apa.16651