Speech and language development of children born at 32 weeks' gestation: a 5-year prospective follow-up study

Speech and language comprehension and production were assessed at the age of 5 years in a cohort of children born preterm at 32 weeks' gestational age (N=55) in comparison with children born at term and of similar age, sex, and social backgrounds. Data both including and excluding major neurological disabilities are presented. Mean performance for the entire group of preterm children was significantly lower than for the controls on most of the measures including the composite IQ scores. When the nine children who had major neurological disabilities were excluded from the preterm “group, statistically significant differences were found on four of the total 12 speech and language measures. In…