Premature birth can lead to poorer language skills

That is the conclusion of a new study by the University of Brighton in collaboration with University of Warwick and Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development in the United States which examined the language skills of more than 700 children who were very premature, moderately late or full term.

Very preterm children consistently performed worse than term-born children, and moderate-late preterm children scored in between.

The study,  Long-Term Stability of Language Performance in Very Preterm, Moderate-Late Preterm, and Term Children, has been published in the Journal of Pediatrics and is one of the first papers to look at the language development across the whole gestation.

The research was led by Dr Suna Eryigit-Madzwamuse, Senior Research Fellow in the University of Brighton’s Centre for Health Research. She said: “Preterm birth accounts for more than 15 million yearly births worldwide. Very preterm children are at increased risk for delays and deficits in various aspects of language and as survival rates following a preterm birth have risen due to improvements in obstetrics and neonatology, preterm birth has emerged as a risk factor for poor development in an increasing proportion of the population.”

Dr Suna Eryigit-Madzwamuse

Parents in Germany who volunteered their children soon after birth saw their children tested at stages up to the age of eight for a range of skills including grammar, sentence production, and language comprehension, quality of speech, grammar correctness and pre-reading skills.

Dr Eryigit-Madzwamuse said: “At all five time points across early development, very preterm children had lower language performance than term-born children. At three of the ages, moderate-late preterm children also scored lower than term-born children and better than very preterm children. The differences are consistent from 20 months to eight years.

“Paediatricians and parents should be made aware that preterm-born children, even those born moderate-late preterm, are at risk for delayed language compared to term children.

“By 20 months of age, children who are performing poorly relative to their peers are likely to continue to perform poorly at later ages, suggesting that standard follow-up assessment of language at the end of the second year of life is highly predictive and may indicate the need for intervention.

“Stability in language performance appears to strengthen over time. From age four to age eight, about 90 per cent of the variance in children’s later language performance was explained by their earlier language performance, suggesting that early intervention, well before school entry, may be critical.

“Similar to what we have found in our previous preterm publications, family socio-economic status has significant impact on these results, explaining the stability over time and differences between three birth groups. Future research should explore the impact of contextual factors, especially within the family and school contexts, on development of preterm children.

“This study also emphasises the importance of frequent checkups in the first couple of years after preterm birth. Through regular checkups in toddlerhood, paediatricians have the opportunity to connect children who have lagging language skills to critical remedial services.”

Find out more about this research.