1. Changing rates of physical and psychosocial impairments over 9 years in cohorts of school beginners in Germany
- Author
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Bernhard T. Baune, Riccardo N. Caniato, Heribert L Stich, Alexander Kraemer, and Marlies Alvarenga
- Subjects
Pediatrics ,medicine.medical_specialty ,business.industry ,Public health ,Confounding ,Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health ,Erikson's stages of psychosocial development ,Cognition ,Intervention (counseling) ,Epidemiology ,medicine ,Medical assessment ,business ,Psychosocial ,Clinical psychology - Abstract
Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate the prevalence of impairments of physical and psychosocial development in children commencing primary school and to analyse changes over 9 years in consecutive cohorts. Patients and method. We utilised a retrospective cross-sectional study design to assess the prevalence of impairments over nine consecutive cohorts of German children beginning school from 1997 to 2005. A total of 9,514 children were assessed for physical and psychosocial impairment using a manualised medical assessment. Results: There was a dramatic increase in the rates of motor and speech disorders detected among children tested over the 9-year period. We observed a seven-fold increase in motor impairments (OR 7.1; 95% CI 4.2–11.7) and almost a three-fold increase in speech disorders (OR 2.6; 95% CI 2.1–3.3) from 1997 to 2005. Males had higher rates of impairment in all domains of functioning as compared to females (26.0% vs 15.3%; p
- Published
- 2008
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