Is early occupational therapy in extremely preterm infants of benefit in the long run?

A total of 126 infants with extremely low birth weight (ELBW; <1000 g) were enrolled in a prospective case-control study in order to examine the effect of occupational therapy based on sensory integration (SI) and neurodevelopmental therapy (NDT) on neurological development. The children were grouped as matched pairs on the basis of determined developmental risk scores assessed at the age of 3 months. The intervention children had a 6-month period of weekly occupational therapy from the corrected age of 6-12 months. The follow-up showed that the social development of the intervention children was significantly better at the age of 12 months, but at the age of 2 years the groups had equal developmental scores in neurological, neuropsychological and speech therapy assessments. The Miller assessment for pre-schoolers (MAP) performed in a total of 96 (92%) of the study children at the age of 4 years failed to demonstrate any significant differences between the groups. It is concluded that this amount of occupational therapy in ELBW infants does not have any detectable effect on long-term neurological development.