Is paediatric assessment of motor development of very preterm and low-birthweight children appropriate?

Aim: To determine whether paediatricians that examine, in regular clinical practice, very preterm and very-low-birthweight children at 5 y of age detect neurological impairments and functional motor problems in these children. Methods: We compared a paediatric judgement, a standardized neurological examination (Touwen examination) and a...

Reliability of classification of cerebral palsy in low-birthweight children in four countries

The reliability of classification of cerebral palsy (CP) in low-birthweight children was assessed by using clinical and research study records sampled from population-based cohort studies in the USA, the Netherlands, Canada, and Germany. Records of neurological examination findings and functional motor assessments were submitted to up to five...

Measuring health status using the Health Utilities Index: Agreement between raters and between modalities of administration

The aim of this study was to evaluate interrater and intermodality agreement in assessing health status using the Health Utilities Index. A random sample from a Dutch cohort of 14-year-old Very Low Birth Weight children and their parents were invited to participate in a face-to-face (n = 150) or telephone (n = 150) interview. All 300...

Self-reported physical disabilities in children in the Netherlands

Purpose: To assess the prevalence of self-reported physical disabilities in school children, through the Child Health Monitoring System. Methods: In 1992/1993, data were obtained in mainstream education (n = 5484), and in 1994/1995 in special education (n = 2622). The data were weighted to calculate estimates representative of the Dutch...