Mothers may not seek help for kids with developmental delays

When mothers trust their friends and neighbors more than doctors or struggle to access or afford care, they may be less likely to seek out medical help for young kids with developmental delays, a small US study suggested.

The study focused on kids who are eligible for therapy through what’s known as Early Intervention, a government program that funds services for infants and toddlers who have developmental delays in things like motor skills, communication, behavior and cognitive function. Fewer than one in four kids eligible for Early Intervention get services, researchers note in Pediatrics, Reuters reported.

The study team interviewed 22 lowincome mothers of African-american and Latino children up to 36 months old who qualified for Early Intervention.

All of the kids received routine wellchild visits and had developmental delays.

But 59 percent of the mothers said their children had never enrolled in Early Intervention.

“In the United States, one in four children under the age of five years is at moderate to high risk of developmental delay, a situation in which children do not achieve motor, language, cognitive, social or adaptive skills when they should,” said lead study author Dawn Magnusson of the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora.

“Many mothers in our study experienced challenges accessing early intervention services due to logistical challenges or and the rest were from Central America. Only seven of the Latino mothers had been in the US for 10 years or more. A majority of the kids had developmental delays in expressive communication; motor delays were the second most common problem. Few mothers, however, identified their child as having developmental delays, the interviews found. Often, women said they believed all children developed at their own pace, or that children who lagged in one area seemed to be ahead in other areas that made their mothers question whether the child could have developmental delays. Women seemed more open to Early Intervention when they had friends who had found these services helpful for their children. Scheduling pressures, finances and other logistics and competing obligations made it hard for some women to start or continue Early Intervention services for their child. Beyond its small size, another limitation of the study is that all of the mothers interviewed had kids who received regular medical care. Parents of kids who don’t get routine well-child checkups might have different beliefs about Early Intervention than the women in the study, the authors noted. Mothers of other racial or ethnic backgrounds, and fathers, might also have different perspectives about Early Intervention.