ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: Clinicians and caregivers rely on milestone checklists as tools for tracking a child's development. In addition, medical students and residents use milestone checklists to learn about normal child development. However, there are multiple published milestone checklists that vary qualitatively in structure and content, hindering their effective use in developmental surveillance and medical education. This project systematically evaluated the consistency and variability between commonly used milestone checklists. METHODS: A team of child psychologists and developmental pediatricians reviewed a total of 1094 milestones derived from 4 published checklists (2 developed for providers, 2 developed for caregivers) to create a comprehensive set of 728 discrete developmental observations, with each observation mapped to corresponding milestones. This observation-milestone relational database was then used to determine the degree of content overlap and milestone age range concordance across milestone checklists. RESULTS: Of the 728 discrete developmental observations, 40 (5.5%) were mapped to milestones in all 4 milestone checklists, and an additional 90 (12.4%) were mapped to 3 checklists. Among these 40 "universal" observations, most (42.5%) were in the motor domain. Of those 130 observations mapped to milestones in at least 3 of the 4 checklists, 26.9% (35/130) were mapped to milestones that were discordant in their associated age range. CONCLUSION: Four commonly used developmental milestone checklists were found to have limited overlap in content, and those that overlapped were inconsistent in their associated age ranges. The resulting observation-milestone relational database could be used to further validate age estimates of milestones and facilitate milestone surveillance through the electronic health record.
Subject(s)
Checklist , Child Development/physiology , Developmental Disabilities/diagnosis , Observation , Pediatrics , Psychology, Child , Checklist/methods , Checklist/standards , Child , Child, Preschool , Databases, Factual , Humans , Infant , Pediatrics/methods , Pediatrics/standards , Psychology, Child/methods , Psychology, Child/standardsABSTRACT
Speech and language delays are common developmental disorders that can lead to long-term academic and psychosocial impairments. Affected families often benefit from instruction in cultivating a language-rich home environment. This study investigated the feasibility of utilizing text messaging to deliver developmental education to families. Parents of children aged 11 to 36 months with concerning language development were enrolled in a 3-month text messaging program. Pre-program and post-program telephone surveys were completed. All enrolled parents were of low socioeconomic status, and 48% were monolingual Spanish speakers. A total of 27 parents (87%) completed the program and follow-up survey. After program completion, parents reported increased awareness of language-promoting activities and local child development resources (P = .002; P = .005). Parents also reported increased engagement in language-promoting activities (P = .004). The marginal program cost was 37 cents per participant. Findings from this pilot study indicate that text messaging is a feasible, engaging, and inexpensive platform for delivering developmental education to families.
