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Introduction:

Although children born preterm (PT) are at known risk for impaired neuromotor development, longitudinal studies using detailed measurements of motor performance are rare. This study investigated developmental changes in goal-directed upper-limb kinematics from 4-8 years old in a sample of children born fullterm (FT) and PT without known developmental disabilities.

Participants and Methods:

3D kinematic recordings of performance with either arm/hand during a goal-directed unimanual precision task were carried out at 4 and 8 years in 37 children (13 very PT, V-PT, < 32 GW; 5 moderately PT, M-PT, 33-35 GW; 19 FT).

Results:

Repeated measures ANOVA revealed significant main effects for group and occasion, and interaction effects between group and occasion, for distal movement duration (p < .0001) and segmentation in terms of movement units (MUs, p < .0001). From initially having displayed less proficient movement organization at 4 years than both children born FT and M-PT, the children born V-PT showed a marked catch-up at 8 years, where no significant group differences remained. The mean between-occasion difference was substantial for both duration and segmentation in V-PT relative the other groups, although with noticeably higher within-group variability (MSD = 1.2 s/7.8 MUs) than M-PT (MSD = 0.5 s/2.5 MUs) and FT (MSD = 0.5 s/4.2 MUs).

Conclusion:

The children born PT, V-PT in particular, generally displayed a considerable gain in fine motor performance from preschool to school age. Compared with the FT and M-PT groups, however, the rate of improvement appears more heterogeneous in the V-PT group