Not living with both parents is associated with more health- and developmental problems in infants aged 7 to 11 months: a cross sectional study

Abstract

BackgroundIn Western countries, many children are affected by the separation of their parents. Our main objective was to assess the possible impact of parental separation family structure on certain aspects of somatic health in low-age children.MethodsWe conducted a cross-sectional study based on data collected in the framework of free preventive medicine consultations in the French Community of Belgium. The data was derived from assessments conducted, between 2006 and 2012, on children 7 to 11 months after birth during which information of 79701 infants was collected regarding the risk of sudden infant death, psychomotor development, and development in terms of height and weight. The main outcome measures were: episode of risk of sudden infant death, polysomnography, home monitoring, psychomotor development, and body mass index.ResultsThe parents of 6.6% of the infants were separated. We established multivariable models, based on the presence or absence of confounders. The adjusted ORs (95% CI) of symptoms perceived as frightening, notably at night, of a prescription for a polysomnography, of an abnormal polysomnography result, and of follow-up by home monitoring were thus respectively 1.3 (1.1–1.6), 1.1 (0.9–1.3), 1.8 (1.3–2.4), and 1.3 (1.1–1.6). The adjusted ORs (95% CI) for psychomotor delay and for a body mass index above the 97th percentile were respectively 1.3 (1.0–1.6) and 1.2 (1.1–1.3) in the event of separation.ConclusionsThis study confirms the possibility that not living with both parents is an independent risk factor for the somatic health and psychomotor development of infants. This observation should be verified because it would have a major impact on the actions of family doctors and other first-line healthcare providers, in particular with regard to information and targeted prevention.

Parental separation: a risk for the psychomotor development of children aged 28 to 32 months? A cross-sectional study

“…Another longitudinal study, conducted in Great Britain, also found that children aged 0 to 8 years who were exposed to parental separation produced poorer results for language, reading, writing, and drawing tests following adjustment for sociocultural environment [ 9 ]. In Belgium, there was also a cross-sectional study conducted in 7- to 11-month-old infants that observed a significant correlation between delayed psychomotor development and parental separation [ 25 ]. In this study, the variable pertaining to the child’s psychomotor development assessed whether there were at least two anomalies at the time the assessment was conducted, while taking into account the child’s age expressed in months as based on the neurological examination.…”