Hyderabad: Neuro Development Disorders in children between the ages of two to nine years are present in 8 to 18 per cent children of this age group. The major causes for this, according to a study carried out by PLOS Medicine, is injury during the birthing process and two, the critical one month post delivery. For the study, a total of 3,469 children were evaluated across the country and of these over 800 children were from Hyderabad.
Seven common NDDs were found, which included vision impairment, epilepsy, neuromotor impairment, cerebral palsy, hearing impairment, speech and language disorders, autism spectrum disorders and hearing disorders. Two additional disorders were found in children from 6 to 9 years of age, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and learning disabilities.
The incidence of these diseases in children at the clinical level is found to be one in eight children from the age group of 2 to 9 years. The study carried out from hospital data confirmed this but researchers say that the actual incidence could be much higher.
Dr Deepika Sirineni, consultant neurologist at Apollo Hospitals, explained, “The study has looked into the preventable causes of NDDs and the stress is on improving the birthing process and proper care so that the incidence can be reduced. The neonatal illness, neurological and brain infections, difficulty in breathing at birth and also hormonal disabilities which are not diagnosed on time lead to listening and speech problems.”
Proper handling of the baby in the first hour of birth and also ensuring that post-partum care of the mother is appropriate, are all very important. The other factors which are found to cause NDDs are poor maternal nutrition, excessive stress, defective foetus which had not been picked up in diagnosis leading to these disorders. Dr M.K. Singh, consultant neurologist, explained, “The damage affects the development of the child and that, if picked up early, can be modified with the help of physiotherapy, learning skills and also using implants or gadgets if they have difficulty in walking, maintaining a balance and other problems. But these are challenging and it requires early intervention to help them cope with it.”
To bring down the incidence of preventable NDDs, researchers state that there must be institutional deliveries and at the hospital level the infection control program in the operation theatre and at the wards must be accurate. These measures will help to bring down the incidence of preventable NDDs.
