Patterns of everyday functioning in preschool children born preterm and at term.
Preterm birth alone does not decide daily-life success; look at the whole child and context.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Andersson et al. (2017) asked parents to rate how well preschoolers handle everyday tasks.
The team looked at kids born preterm and kids born on time.
They used answers to sort the children into seven everyday-functioning profiles.
What they found
Seven clear patterns showed up.
About seven in ten children, preterm or not, had strong daily skills.
The other three in ten struggled, but the struggle came from many small risks acting together, not just early birth.
How this fits with other research
Laugeson et al. (2014) used the same person-first method with preschoolers who have Down syndrome. They also found wide skill gaps, but the gaps sat in working memory and planning, not general living skills.
Smits et al. (2011) tracked kids with cerebral palsy for three years and saw steady gains in self-care and social play. Karin’s cross-sectional map lines up: most preterm kids look like their term peers right now, echoing the CP finding that early risk does not lock in low function.
Howe et al. (2010) reported high feeding issues in Taiwanese preterm toddlers. That seems to clash with Karin’s “most do fine” view. The gap is about domain: Tsu-Hsin zoomed in on feeding only, while Karin looked at broad daily life. A child can eat poorly yet still score in the strong-functioning group if language, play, and self-care are on track.
Why it matters
Do not let “preterm” on the chart steer your goals. Run a full strengths-and-needs scan, then pick targets the same way you would for any preschooler. If the child lands in the three-in-ten weak group, hunt for the pile-up of risks—maybe vision, maybe behavior, maybe family stress—and tackle those together instead of blaming early birth alone.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
BACKGROUND/AIM: Children born preterm are at risk of neonatal complications but the long-term consequences for everyday functioning is not well known. The study aimed to identify patterns of everyday functioning in preschool children born preterm and at term in relation to perinatal data, neonatal risk factors, behaviour, and socioeconomic status. Registry data and data from parent rated questionnaires were collected for 331 children. METHOD: A person-oriented approach with a cluster analysis was used. RESULTS: A seven cluster solution explained 65.91% of the variance. Most children (n=232) showed patterns of strong everyday functioning. A minority of the children (n=99), showed diverse patterns of weak everyday functioning. Perinatal characteristics, neonatal risk factors and socio-economics did not predict cluster group membership. Children born preterm were represented in all clusters. CONCLUSION, IMPLICATIONS: Most preschool children are perceived by their parents with strong everyday functioning despite being born preterm. However small groups of children are, for various reasons, perceived with weak functioning, but preterm birth is not the sole contributor to patterns of weak everyday functioning. More critical for all children's everyday functioning is probably the interaction between individual factors, behavioural factors and contextual factors. To gain a broader understanding of children's everyday functioning. Child Health Services need to systematically consider aspects of body function, activity and in addition participation and environmental aspects.
Research in developmental disabilities, 2017 · doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2017.06.005