Why do developmental milestones matter?

Legacy_user

I think a lot of the expectations of "child must do X Y Z by a certain age" comes from health visitors, and their advice is always to push the child to do those things

But as long as they aren't disabled and eventually do those things why does it matter whether he/she does it by X months of age?

School is so slow paced that its easy to catch up. I was late speaking but did better than the other kids at school

jackomdj

It is a sign of how the child is doing, obviously not all children do things at the same rate, but it helps indicate if additional help is required or if there may be a development problem.

System

I think they might be a bit too quick to judge children, if they're disabled it'll become apparent. All this pressure in infancy and then at school they have 11 years to learn basic maths

jackyann

Health Visitors should not be "pushing" children to do certain things. They should be supporting and encouraging parents and carers to provide an encouraging environment for their child.

Developmental milestones are important because if a child doesn't meet them, that is often the first sign of a problem of some kind (that is often how disabilities are diagnosed) That problem could be due to many reasons. If untreated the child may experience further problems.

Walking is a good example. The "average age" to walk is about 13 months, but can of course be sooner. If a child is not walking at 18 months, they are usually referred for a doctor's assessment. 90% of children who aren't walking at 18 months will quite naturally walk by age 2. However, it makes sense to begin investigations because if you wait until 2, valuable therapeutic time may be wasted.
Reasons for not walking may be: not being encouraged or put in a position to walk (such as being left in a cot); having a physical problem with the back or legs; having a neurological problem. All of these may be treatable.
If not, and the child is going to have difficulty walking, then they need help with moving to enable other development.

Although each aspect of development is different, similar principles can be applied to all milestones. Most children who are late talking, end up with no speech problem at all; but how, other than comparing to normal development milestones, would you know?

These simple, early checks are not the same as "school type exams". They are diagnostic checks, to help & support children and their families. They have been researched over many years, and continue to be updated and re-considered.

It is always a worry when a child is not meeting a development milestone, as there are usually no quick and easy "tests" to check for problems - there is a lot of waiting, during which families should be supported.

If you are worried, ask to talk to another Health Visitor, or a community paediatrician (most GPs are not as well versed in child development as these professions)

Hope this helps

AnotherJoe

MatthewAinsworth wrote: »

I think a lot of the expectations of "child must do X Y Z by a certain age" comes from health visitors, and their advice is always to push the child to do those things

errm, no it isn't.

bouicca21

I still remember when dd 'failed' a developmental test. It was the one where at some point the child had to put three bricks on top of each other. The health visitor at the baby clinic literally grabbed us when we were just coming out if the loo and pulled us into her room. DD, who was and still is, best described as stubborn, took an instant dislike to her and refused to do any of the tests or to talk. The health visitor was writing her up as having serious learning difficulties plus clearly labelling me as unable to acknowledge the problem since I was obviously deluded when I told her DD was being deliberately unco-operative. Then as we left DD started to tell me in fluent and quite advanced language just how horrid the lady was and why she wasn't going to do anything she wanted. The report got re-written.

omeg

First post by me, a recently retired Health Visitor with 35 years experience.

I couldn't count how many developmental assessments I have done, or how many children I referred for follow up because of concerns.
Probably about half of the referrals were actually fine, but the process needed to begin. Of the others, who need need extra help - of varying types, most of the families already had the beginnings of concerns, but some didn't, not because they weren't perfectly reasonable parents, but because it sometimes isn't very obvious.
Most of the families continued to use me as a regular support & resource.
Some of course "blamed the messenger".
I can think of 3 who could not deal with the child or situation and the children needed caring for by others.

Also, at 5 routine development assessments I picked up life-threatening conditions, which needed immediate paediatric assessment & hospital admission. All of those were necessary. Of course, parents would have recognised those in the next few hours or days, but we got early admission and help with whatever followed. I won't go into greater detail as they would be recognisable.

Not such an amusing story as boudicca's.

teddysmum

My cousin's eldest son didn't speak until he was 5, yet was the first of his generation to earn a degree. When asked why he hadn't spoken (he did so suddenly and fluently), he replied that he saw no point as he got his own way without bothering.


Better that a child is monitored, just in case they have a problem, than have it ignored until valuable remedial time has been wasted.