During childhood, the nervous system of children must mature, acquiring new functions and perfecting them.
The best way to assess whether there is any type of dysfunction in the nervous system is assessing psychomotor development of the little ones.
We begin with this a series of entries in which we will explain the system used in the health protocols of Spain (Haizea-Llevant) to carry out these assessments, with the intention of making it known.
The objective of these evaluations, which must be carried out by trained personnel (usually done by pediatricians and nurses in the primary care consultation), is to detect possible delays in psychomotor development. In other words, it is not tried to see how correct the development of a baby or child is being nor is it about defining the degree of delay that it may have, it simply seeks to detect possible developmental anomalies and then diagnose them if they really exist (of similar to the growth and weight charts, which seek to detect, but not diagnose).
The truth is that in the face of developmental failures, effective treatment is rarely available, however, the early establishment of therapeutic measures helps to prevent and treat possible deficiencies. The sooner you start "treating" the little one, the better results will be obtained.
We all know that children have different rhythms when they mature. That is why they are used, to detect disorders, the so-called screening, whose purpose is to quickly and easily detect a large part of children with developmental problems.
The Screenings are simple and easy to interpret application tests (You will see) although, as I say, it is recommended that they be carried out by trained personnel who can make a correct interpretation.
Many of these tests are assessed by simple observation of the child or can be answered by the mother. Others instead must be done "in situ" and the ideal is that the conditions that involve children are as usual and appropriate as possible (that is not hungry, that we have not finished waking, that situations are not forced ...) .
They are based on the work carried out by a group of experts (Estudi Llevant of 1984) who studied a population of 1,702 children aged between 15 days and 24.5 months, considering a representative sample of the population under two years from Catalonia. The Haizea study is usually used for those older than 2 years.
In a few days I will explain the Haizea-Llevant Table, which encompasses all screenings, and explain how it is used.
