Motor development at term of very low birthweight infants with bronchopulmonary dysplasia

Forty-one preterm infants weighing less than 1500 g and less than 32 weeks' gestation at birth had a Dubowitz neurological assessment performed at 40 weeks postconceptional age. The infants were classified into three groups. Eight infants had bronchopulmonary dysplasia and severe central nervous system abnormalities, 11 infants had bronchopulmonary dysplasia alone, and 22 infants had neither bronchopulmonary dysplasia nor severe central nervous system abnormalities. The neuromotor performance of these three groups of infants was similar on all the Dubowitz assessment items at 40 weeks postconceptional age. Neuromotor development of very low birthweight infants with severe bronchopulmonary dysplasia appears to be no different from that of infants without bronchopulmonary dysplasia at 40 weeks postconceptional age utilizing the Dubowitz neurological assessment.