MADRID, 23 (Reuters/EP)
An international study coordinated by the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam (the Netherlands) has revealed that children born prematurely might have more difficulties to develop their language skills during childhood, both reading and writing.
Thus emerges from the results of a study published in the journal ' Pediatrics ' in which analysed data from 1,529 preterm births before week 37 gestation and 945 boys born on the scheduled date.
In this way, and according to recognize the authors, have observed that birth prematurely does not require that these babies are intended to have language in the long term problems, but do pass through more difficult times, especially between 3 and 12 years of age.
“as they grow, children born suffer difficulties with the more complex linguistic functions,” said Inge van Noort-van der Spek, author of the study.
In fact, the results showed that there were little differences between preterm infants and the rest in regards to their basic language skills, such as the development of basic vocabulary in the first two years of life.
, However, between 3 and 12 years old the gap used to expand when language skills is more advanced, as the reading and writing of complex, precisely when most sentences need it, according to experts, which can lead to “problems and limitations” in school or social activities of these children.
“preterm infants are at risk for problems of language and linguistic tasks become more necessary, the proportion of children with major problems also increases,” added the pediatrician Thuy Mai Luu, of the University of Montreal in Canada.
In research, this expert discovered that premature children often “catching up” with his contemporaries in the basic language and, in fact, there are brain research suggesting that they may develop “compensatory” nerve connections linked to simple language skills.
Is possible, however, for more complex language tasks for a limit in the cerebral capacity of compensation, added Luu.
