Elsevier

The Journal of Pediatrics

Volume 149, Issue 5, November 2006, Pages 617-622
The Journal of Pediatrics

Original article
Early gross motor development of preterm infants according to the Alberta Infant Motor Scale

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpeds.2006.07.025Get rights and content

Objective

To systematically examine gross motor development in the first 18 months of life of preterm infants.

Study design

A total of 800 preterm infants (356 boys), ages between 1 and 18 months and corrected for degree of prematurity, were assessed with the use of the Alberta Infant Motor Scale.

Results

Comparison of the mean Alberta Infant Motor Scale scores of the preterm infants with the norm-referenced values derived from term infants revealed that as a group, the preterm infants scored significantly lower at all age levels, even with full correction for degree of prematurity.

Conclusions

In general, preterm infants exhibit different gross motor developmental trajectories compared with term infants in the first 18 months of life. The gross motor developmental profile of preterm infants may reflect a variant of typical gross motor development, which seems most likely to be specific for this population. As a consequence, adjusted norms should be used for proper evaluation and clinical decision-making in relation to preterm infants.

Section snippets

Patients

During a 12-year period (December 1993 to November 2005), 2228 preterm infants with a gestational age (GA) of ≤32 weeks who were nursed in one NICU of a regional tertiary level perinatal center survived the NICU period. Of these, 800 infants (35.9%) fulfilled our inclusion criteria. They were of a slightly shorter GA (mean = 29.4; SD = 1.7) compared with the nonincluded infants (mean = 29.7; SD = 1.9) (t = 3.75, df = 2226, P < .0001) and had lower birth weight (BW) (mean = 1194; SD = 292)

Association Between Selected Variables and AIMS Scores

A significant association was found between GA and AIMS total score only at 5 to 6 months (F[2,62] = 6,20, P = .004). Post hoc analyses, however, revealed no significant differences between the groups (GA, 24 5/7 to 28 weeks: n = 17, mean = 15.18, SD = 3.07; GA, 28 1/7 to 30 weeks: n = 21, mean = 14.95, SD = 2.46; GA, 30 1/7 to 32 weeks: n = 24, mean = 16.83, SD = 5.10; P = .082). There was a significant association between BW (subdivided into infants <1250 g and ≥1250 g) and AIMS total score

Discussion

This study identified significant differences in early gross motor development of preterm infants compared with term infants, even after full correction for prematurity. These results were not systematically influenced by any of the variables measured in this study. Three other studies have reported similar findings at selected age levels.2, 6, 22 This study presents comprehensive analyses on the differences between preterm and term infants’gross motor development on the full age range from 1

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