title: Relationship between head dimensions and body length in the context of mental retardation.
abstract: The relationship and possible disproportion between different cranial dimensions--head length, head circumference and biparietal diameter--body length and developmental status in normocephalic children were studied in 166 mentally retarded and 471 normal control subjects, between the ages of 3 months and 6 years. When the total cohort was analyzed, all dimensions, particularly head length, were found to be significantly reduced in the study group compared with the controls. Stratification into three age-groups revealed that in the 3- to 15-month-old subjects, head length was the most significantly reduced dimension, while in the older children body length was more significant, followed by head length. Further discriminant analysis resulted in a formula consisting of only three factors--body length, head length and age. Head circumference and biparietal diameter were noncontributory. This investigation did not support the concept of a disproportionately small head compared with height in normocephalic mentally retarded children, but rather a general growth failure mostly affecting height and head length.
authors.affiliation: Hannah Khoushy Child Development Center, Haifa City Medical Center (Rothschild), Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Israel.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Jaffe
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Tirosh
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Pollak
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Korman
mesh_terms: D001827:Body Height; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D006257:Head / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008607:Intellectual Disability / Q000473:pathology*