This Article  • Full text  • PDF  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Citation map  • Citing articles on HighWire  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in this journal  Topic Collections  • Medical Practice  • Medical Practice, Other  • Neurology  • Behavioral Neurology  • Pediatric Neurology  • Seizures, Nonepileptic  • Otolaryngology/ Head & Neck Surgery  • Hearing Loss/ Deafness  • Child Development  • Psychiatry  • Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder  • Autism  • Alert me on articles by topic  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

Sheree L. Boulet, DrPH, MPH; Coleen A. Boyle, PhD; Laura A. Schieve, PhD

Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2009;163(1):19-26.

Objective  To present nationally representative estimates of health-related limitations, needs, and service use among US children with and without developmental disabilities (DDs).

Design  Retrospective analysis of data from a sample of US households from the 1997-2005 National Health Interview Surveys.

Participants  Children aged 3 to 17 years (n = 95 132).

Main Outcome Measures  Parents or other knowledgeable adults reported on their children's DDs, health needs, and use of health and education services. Developmental disabilities included attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, autism, blindness, cerebral palsy, deaf/a lot of trouble hearing, learning disability, mental retardation, seizures, stuttering/stammering, and other developmental delay.

Results  Among children with 1 or more DDs, prevalence estimates for limitations in movement (6.1%), needed help with personal care (3.2%), needed special equipment (3.5%), received home health care (1.4%), and regularly took prescription medication(s) (37.5%) were 4 to 32 times higher than for children without DDs. Children with DDs were 2 to 8 times as likely to have had more than 9 health care visits (14.9%), received special education (38.8%), had a surgical or medical procedure (7.5%), and recently visited a medical specialist (23.9%), mental health professional (26.6%), therapist/allied health professional (19.6%), and/or emergency department (10.3%). Effects were generally stable during the study interval and independent of age, race, sex, and family income. Cerebral palsy, autism, mental retardation, blindness, and deafness/a lot of trouble hearing were associated with the highest levels of health and functional impact indicators.

Conclusions  Developmental disabilities profoundly affect children's health and functioning. These data can inform evidence-based targeted prevention strategies for minimizing functional limitations and lifetime disability. Additional study of unmet needs and access to care is needed.

Author Affiliation: National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia.

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?

THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES

Prevalence of Parent-Reported Diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder Among Children in the US, 2007
Kogan et al.
Pediatrics 2009;124:1395-1403.
ABSTRACT | FULL TEXT