Early Therapy Services Following Neonatal Intensive Care Unit Discharge.
Odochi Nwabara, Cynthia Rogers, Terrie Inder and 1 others
PMID 27967287WHAT IT FOUND
Most preterm infants left the NICU with a therapy referral, but 13 of 57 never received therapy by age two.
PT was used more often and started earlier on average than OT or SLP.
Key findings
0152 of 57 infants received a therapy referral at NICU discharge, but 13 had no documented therapy services in the first two years.
02PT was received by 41 infants, OT by 26, and SLP by 23; average activation was 4.3 months corrected age for PT, 5.1 months for OT, and 14.0 months for SLP.
03Therapy use was more likely in infants with more days on ventilation, abnormal behavior at term equivalent age, or single mothers.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTsWhat it means for OTsWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The analysis used 57 infants from 136 enrolled, and 29 were excluded only for living in Illinois, so the sample is small and may not represent all preterm infants. The study was done at one urban Missouri site, where early intervention eligibility and service rules may differ from other states. Therapy use was tracked retrospectively from records, so services outside the hospital system and statewide early intervention may have been missed. The study did not identify why 13 infants did not activate therapy. It observed naturally occurring therapy use and did not test whether therapy caused better or worse outcomes. It could not document or quantify the quality of therapy. Infants with more impairment may have been more likely to receive therapy, which makes it hard to separate therapy effects from underlying delay.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that early therapy improved or worsened development. This study tracked naturally occurring therapy use in a small observational cohort and did not compare treated and untreated groups in a way that can show cause.