title: The effects of military deployment on early child development.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The purpose of this observational, point prevalence study is to determine if parental deployment affects the cognitive, social and emotional development of preschool age children in the military family.
  
  
  METHODS
  Demographic information was collected and an age-appropriate Ages and Stages Questionnaire (ASQ-3) and Ages and Stages Social-Emotional Inventory (ASQ:SE) were administered. The primary outcome measure was the failure rates on the developmental instruments.
  
  
  RESULTS
  We identified 151 parents of eligible children; 95 children had a parent that deployed during their lifetime. We found a significant difference in ASQ-3 failure rates for children in the deployed group compared to those in the nondeployed group. Children of deployed parents were at least twice as often to fail the ASQ-3 or ASQ:SE developmental screen compared to children whose parents did not deploy. 30.5% of children in the deployed group failed the ASQ-3 screen while 12.5% of children who did not have a deployed parent failed (P=.009). On the ASQ:SE developmental screen, 16.8% of children who had a parent deploy failed versus 5.4% of children who did not have a parent deploy (P=.031).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This study suggests that parental deployment is related to adverse risk for developmental delays in children in military families. The psychological burden on military children could be life-long or require significant resources to address. These adverse outcomes could be possibly mitigated by early detection of developmental delay and firm attention to aggressive screening techniques in military communities.
authors.affiliation: Womack Army Medical Center, Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
authors.forename: Dana R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Nguyen
authors.forename: Juliana
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ee
authors.forename: Cristobal S
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Berry-Cabán
authors.forename: Kyle
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Hoedebecke
mesh_terms: D002648:Child; D002657:Child Development; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D002658:Developmental Disabilities / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008297:Male; D008889:Military Personnel; D010290:Parents; D018570:Risk Assessment; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014481:United States
keywords: ASQ-3; ASQ:SE; child development; military deployment