Risk factors for delayed speech development in children of early and preschool age

Abstract

Speech is the most critical component of the neuropsychic development of a child. Over the past decade, an increase in the prevalence of delayed speech development (DSD) in children has been recorded worldwide. Timely diagnosis and correction of DSD at the early stages can lead to good results and minor violations of speech development in the future. Objective. To execute a comparative analysis of risk factors and the leading causes of the DSD development in children of early and preschool age in the Belgorod region from 2019 to 2021. Materials and methods. The analysis of 165 medical records of children examined and treated at the Belgorod Medical Center for the period from 2019 to 2021 was carried out. Results. DSD was found to be more common in children aged 1.5 to 3 years (79.5%), much less common in children over the age of 4 years (6.6%).DSD in boys (69.7%) occurs more than two times more common than girls (30.9%). The average age of mothers of DSD children ranged from 30 to 35 years. More than 50% of all DSD children are premature babies. All mothers of the examined patients had a complicated pregnancy and delivery in their history. Children living in the city (62.5%) had a 25% higher probability of DSD occurrence than children from rural areas (37.5%). According to the results of the study, lesions of the visual organs, residual and perinatal lesions of the central nervous system were the most common forms of pathology in DSD children. Conclusion. It is necessary to improve the early diagnosis and prevention of the DSD in children. Early detection of deviations in the child’s speech development will allow timely drug therapy and comprehensive systematic corrective work.