
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, September 22, 1994                   TAG: 9409240030
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: BOSTON                                  LENGTH: Medium

TINIEST PREEMIES FACE HANDICAPS

A medical revolution a decade ago that made possible the survival of very tiny premature babies has led to a generation of disabled children who are often retarded, severely nearsighted and inattentive, a study shows.

Their disabilities vary greatly. Some of these children are blind or cannot walk; others are virtually normal or have only subtle learning problems.

In general, though, doctors found these youngsters to be at ``a serious disadvantage in every skill required for adequate performance in school.''

The study documents the unfortunate side of a seeming medical miracle.

Until the early 1980s, babies born under about 2 pounds had little chance of survival. But the advent of newborn intensive care units has allowed many of these premature infants to live, although often with medical bills in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Even though they survive, serious health problems persist from birth. Most result because their bodies were simply too underdeveloped to cope with the world outside the womb.

While the children's health ills in early life have been well documented, the latest study is the most ambitious effort to see how they affect the youngsters as they grow older.

Doctors from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland studied babies who were born between 1982 and 1986. They gave a battery of tests to 68 babies who weighed an average of 11/2 pounds at birth. Then they compared them with 65 larger preemies and 61 full-term babies.

Dr. Maureen Hack and colleagues described the results in today's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Among the findings:

Half of the smallest premature babies had IQs under 85. In the general population, 15 percent of people have IQs this low.

21 percent of the smallest babies were retarded, compared with 2 percent of the full-term babies.

25 percent had extremely poor eyesight, including four babies who were blind. Two percent of the full-term babies had eyes this bad.

The smallest preemies also showed signs of behavioral and attention problems as well as poorer social skills.

As a result of their problems, 45 percent of these youngsters required special education in school.

by CNB