title: Motor function in 5-year-old children with cerebral palsy in the South Australian population.
abstract: The aim of this study was to describe the motor function of a population of children at age 5 years enrolled on the South Australian Cerebral Palsy Register. Among children born between 1993 and 1998, there were 333 with confirmed cerebral palsy (prevalence rate 2.2 per 1000 live births), in whom 247 assessments (56.7% males, 43.3% females) were completed. The distribution by Gross Motor Function Classification System (GMFCS) level was: level I, 50.6%; level II, 18.2%; level III, 9.3%; level IV, 9.7%; level V, 12.1%. The most common topographical classification was spastic diplegia (38.5%), followed by spastic hemiplegia (34.8%) and spastic quadriplegia (14.6%). Abnormal movements occurred at rest or with intention in 19.4% of children. A high proportion of the population with relatively mild gross motor impairments have difficulty with everyday bimanual tasks, reinforcing the need to assess upper limb function independently of gross motor function. The use of ankle-foot orthoses was common, particularly across GMFCS levels II to IV. Further refinement is indicated for this population's motor dataset, to include more recently described classification measures as well as future novel measures to better describe the presence of both spasticity and dystonia.
authors.affiliation: Paediatric Rehabilitation Department, Children, Youth and Women's Health Service, Women's and Children's Hospital, 72 King William Road, North Adelaide, South Australia 5006, Australia. james.rice@cywhs.sa.gov.au
authors.forename: James
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Rice
authors.forename: Remo
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Russo
authors.forename: Julie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Halbert
authors.forename: Phillipa
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Van Essen
authors.forename: Eric
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Haan
mesh_terms: D002547:Cerebral Palsy / Q000145:classification* / Q000150:complications / Q000503:physiopathology; D002657:Child Development / Q000145:classification; D002675:Child, Preschool; D015331:Cohort Studies; D004185:Disability Evaluation; D020820:Dyskinesias / Q000145:classification* / Q000150:complications / Q000175:diagnosis; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009128:Muscle Spasticity / Q000145:classification / Q000150:complications; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000145:classification*; D012042:Registries / Q000592:standards*; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D013021:South Australia