Medical conditions of children and young people with Down syndrome.
Kids with Down syndrome carry a heavy load of treatable medical issues—cardiac, vision, dental, thyroid—so build multidisciplinary screening into every care plan.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Doctors in Italy read the charts of 763 children and teens with Down syndrome. They wrote down every extra health problem each child had.
What they found
Most kids had more than one medical issue. Heart, lung, eye, tooth, and thyroid problems showed up again and again.
How this fits with other research
Hickey et al. (2025) looked at 2,321 U.S. patients and saw the same pattern. Their bigger group even adds newborn data, so we now know the load starts at birth.
Gastelum Guerrero et al. (2024) pooled blood-test studies and found bad lipid profiles across Down syndrome. The Italian chart review fits right inside that bigger picture.
Fullana et al. (2007) used state records to show half of these kids are hospitalized before age three, mostly for breathing trouble. The Italian list of lung problems helps explain why those early stays happen.
Why it matters
When you write a behavior plan, tack on a health checklist. Schedule echo, eye, dental, and thyroid screens every year. Treating ear fluid or giving thyroid pills can cut problem behaviors faster than any token board.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
BACKGROUND: The life expectancy of people with Down syndrome (DS) has significantly increased in the last decades. We describe the congenital malformations and main comorbidities of a cohort of children and young people with DS and analyse their differences according to age and gender groups. METHODS: This retrospective cross-sectional study was conducted at DS centre of Bambino Gesù Children's Hospital in Rome (Italy). The period for reviewing all electronic health records ran from July 2016 to September 2017. We collected data on clinical conditions and compared them with the general paediatric population. Moreover, we compared the main comorbidities, dental diseases and body mass index data between age groups. RESULTS: Seven hundred sixty-three children and young people with DS included in this study were aged 7.45 ± 5.49 years. Gender distribution included 58.19% male patients. The majority of our population (71.04%) came from central regions of Italy. Respiratory diseases (19%), congenital heart defects (72.23%), malocclusions (58.62%), astigmatism (20.31%), farsightedness (16.51%), near-sightedness (12.19%) and autoimmune hypothyroidism (3.28%) were more frequent in our population compared with the typical paediatric population. Upper respiratory tract infections and underweight were significantly more frequent in the youngest children, whereas dental diseases, refractive errors, obesity and autoimmune hypothyroidism increased over age. CONCLUSIONS: Children and young people with DS present a high prevalence of potentially treatable medical conditions making multidisciplinary teams a mandatory need for this population.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 2021 · doi:10.1111/jir.12804