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Aim: This paper aimed to analyse the association between small for size at birth, stunting, recovery from stunting and pubertal development in a rural Bangladeshi cohort.Methods: The participants were 994 girls and 987 boys whose mothers participated in the Maternal and Infant Nutrition Interventions in Matlab trial. The birth cohort was followed from birth to puberty 2001-2017. Pubertal development according to Tanner was self-assessed. Age at menarche was determined and in boys, consecutive height measurements were used to ascertain whether pubertal growth spurt had started. The exposures and outcomes were modelled by Cox's proportional hazards analyses and logistic regression.Results: There was no difference in age at menarche between girls that were small or appropriate for gestational age at birth. Boys born small for gestational age entered their pubertal growth spurt later than those with appropriate weight. Children who were stunted had later pubertal development, age at menarche and onset of growth spurt than non-stunted children. Children who recovered from infant or early childhood stunting had similar pubertal development as non-stunted children.Conclusion: Infant and childhood stunting was associated with a later pubertal development. Recovery from stunting was not associated with earlier puberty in comparison with non-stunted children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: This study determined possible discrepancies between verbal IQ and performance IQ in 8-year-old very preterm (VPT) and extremely preterm (EPT) children, and examined associations between verbal IQ and performance IQ, and sociodemographic factors, perinatal factors, early cognitive outcomes and also with school achievement scores.Methods: This prospective cohort study included 120 eight-year-old VPT/EPT children. Cognitive development was assessed at the ages of 2, 5 and 8 years. Eight years' school achievement results in arithmetic, reading and spelling were collected. Multiple regression analyses were performed to determine predictors of verbal IQ and performance IQ at the age of 8 years and to determine associations with school achievement scores.Results: Mean performance IQ (89.8) was significantly lower than mean verbal IQ (99.4; Cohen's d = 0.59) at the age of 8 years. Gestational age (GA), small for GA status, and cognitive scores at the ages of 2 and 5 years significantly predicted verbal IQ and performance IQ at the age of 8 years. Performance IQ at age 8 years was an important predictor for arithmetic scores (β = 0.42).Conclusion: Performance IQ was more strongly affected than verbal IQ in 8-year-old VPT/EPT children and was strongly related to mathematical difficulties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: The emotional connection between mothers and infants born preterm has been associated with positive behaviour. The aim of this study was to examine the longitudinal association between emotional connection at six months of age and behavioural problems at three years.Methods: This study was carried out by the University of North Texas, USA and comprised 49 mothers and infants from a longitudinal investigation of family interaction and infant development conducted in 1994-1997. Face-to-face interaction and toy-based play were videotaped and coded at six months of age using the Welch Emotional Connection Screen (WECS), a brief screening tool for relational health. When the children were three years of age, the mothers reported on child behavioural problems.Results: The children from dyads that were rated as emotionally connected at six months of age had fewer externalising and internalising behavioural problems at the age of three. No links were found between emotional connection during toy-based play at six months and later child behavioural problems.Conclusion: We showed that when the WECS was used at six months of age it was a promising and valid relational screening tool for infants at risk of adverse behavioural outcomes at the age of three. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: Studies of children's early ability to communicate have mainly focused on mother-child dyads. That is why this study analysed the long-term effects of triadic interactions involving both parents.Method: This prospective pilot study monitored child-mother-father communication in 19 families from the general population in Sweden using the standardised Lausanne Trilogue Play method in a video studio. The families and their first-born child were initially followed from three months to 48 months of age. Preschool teachers assessed the children at the age of four using the Preschool Behaviour Questionnaire and then their teachers assessed the subjects at the age of 15 using the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. Early communication was analysed in relation to the children's social competence at the age of 15.Results: The child's skills in initiating turn-taking sequences and their parents' responses to this correlated with the child's social competence at the age of four, as reported in a previous study from our group, and at the age of 15, as reported here.Conclusion: The results of this study indicated that stimulating children's capacity to initiate turn-taking sequences in infancy improved their social competence at the age of 15, confirming positive results at four years of age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: This study established predictive properties of single language milestones for specific language impairment (SLI) after the age of four, as these had not previously been reported in the literature.Methods: In this nested case-control study, children attending special needs schools for severe speech and language difficulties were matched with children attending mainstream schools. Data covering the ages of zero to four years were retrieved from well-child care clinics and the outcomes of 23 language milestones in the Dutch Developmental Instrument were analysed. The predictive properties were expressed as positive likelihood ratios, sensitivity and specificity.Results: We included 253 pairs of children with and without SLI, aged from four to 11 years. The mean age was eight years and three months, and 77% were boys. From the age of 18 months, cases and controls differed significantly on all milestones (p < 0.01). After 24 months, the language milestones had positive likelihood ratios that ranging from 6 to 108. In general, language milestones had a high specificity (range 77-100%), but the sensitivity was relatively low (range 0-68%).Conclusion: Failure to meet language milestones from the age of 24 months was predictive of SLI, but the use of separate milestones had limited value due to low sensitivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: This study compared postnatal growth patterns calculated using different reference data in a large cohort of very preterm infants.Methods: The weight, length and head circumference of 551 very preterm infants born in the Tyrol, Austria, between 2003 and 2011, were obtained at birth, discharge and the corrected ages of three, 12 and 24 months. Growth data are presented as Z-scores in relation to four reference populations: LMS growth by Pan et al., Fenton preterm growth charts, the Euro-Growth Study Group and the World Health Organization (WHO) Anthro programme.Results: We observed significant differences in mean weight Z-scores using the four reference populations, with the WHO data being the highest. The mean head circumference Z-scores also differed significantly at all time points. We observed a pronounced gap in the microcephaly rate, which was 10 times higher at the age of 24 months if the Pan data were used instead of the WHO data.Conclusion: Our findings revealed significant deviations between the interpretation of postnatal growth depending on the reference data used, with the most striking differences seen in head circumference. The choice of reference data, and particularly the conclusions drawn from the data, must be interpreted with utmost care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: Published Growth studies from Latin America are limited to growth references from Argentina and Venezuela. The aim of this study was to construct reference growth curves for height, weight, body mass index (BMI) and head circumference of Colombian children in a format that is useful for following the growth of the individual child and as a tool for public health.Methods: Prospective measurements from 27 209 Colombian children from middle and upper socio-economic level families were processed using the generalised additive models for location, scale and shape (GAMLSS).Results: Descriptive statistics for length and height, weight, BMI and head circumference for age are given as raw and smoothed values. Final height was 172.3 cm for boys and 159.4 cm for girls. Weight at 18 years of age was 64.0 kg for boys and 54 kg for girls. Growth curves are presented in a ± 3 SD format using logarithmic axes.Conclusion: The constructed reference growth curves are a start for following secular trends in Colombia and are also in the presented layout an optimal clinical tool for health care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: To assess the association between weight gain at different time periods during childhood and measures of adiposity in late adolescence.Methods: A population-based birth cohort carried out in Pelotas, a 320 000-inhabitant city in a relatively developed area in Southern Brazil. All newborns in the city's hospitals were enrolled in 1982. Weight gain from 0-1, 1-2, 2-4 and 4-15 years were expressed as changes in weight-for-age Z-scores relative to the NCHS/WHO reference. In 2000, 79% (2250) of all males were located when enrolling at the national Army. Weight and height were assessed. Body composition indicators (fat mass/height(2), lean mass/height(2), fat mass/lean mass(2.3)) were estimated through bioimpedance. Analyses were adjusted for maternal and social factors, as well as for gestational age.Results: In the adjusted analyses, birthweight and weight gain in the first year of life were positively associated with attained height at age 18 years. Except for the fat mass/lean mass(2.3) ratio, all weight-related outcomes were positively associated with weight gain in different periods of life. Children who gained weight rapidly in more than one time period became fatter at age 18 years, independently of when fast growth took place.Conclusions: Height was primarily determined by fetal and infant growth. Weight-related indices, including the fat/lean mass ratio, were more strongly influenced by later growth. No clear critical windows of growth during which absolute tissue masses are programmed could be identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: To describe an evidence-based model for preventive child health care and present some findings from baseline measurements.Methods: The model includes: parent education; methods for interaction and language training; follow-up of low birthweight children; identification and treatment of postnatal depression, interaction difficulties, motor problems, parenthood stress, and psychosocial problems. After baseline measurements at 18 mo (cohort I), the intervention was tested on children from 0 to 18 mo at 18 child health centres in Uppsala County (cohort II). Eighteen centres in other counties served as controls. Two centres from a privileged area were included in the baseline measurements as a "contrasting" sample. Data are derived from health records and questionnaires to nurses and mothers.Results: Baseline experiment (n = 457) and control mothers (n = 510) were largely comparable in a number of respects. Experiment parents were of higher educational and occupational status, and were more frequently of non-Nordic ethnicity. Mothers in the privileged area (n = 72) differed from other mothers in several respects. Experiment nurses devoted considerably fewer hours per week to child health services and to child patients than did control nurses.Conclusions: Despite certain differences, experiment and control samples appeared comparable enough to permit, in a second step, conclusions about the effectiveness of the intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]