Prematureproject - Background

Children born prematurely, have significantly better chance of survival these last decades. At the same time there is a documented risk for both phsycological and physiological developmental disturbances or -delay especially children born extremely early, that is before 28th week of pregnancy or birthweight less than 1500 gram.

This is documented internationally and supported by studies in Norway; Sommerfeldt and the Ullevålundersøkelsen - Smith, Ulvund & Lindemann.
In J. Tunby's follow-up study on 117 VLBW children born in Troms and Finnmark, the parents of 37 prosent of the children with birthweight less than 1500 gram reported about develpomental disturbances like learning difficulties, behavioral problems, language delays, ADHD, autism, motoric delays, various degree of CP, epilepsi and visual- and hearing-problems. The Consensus-conference ”Limits for treatment of premature children” in November 1998 concluded that it was a huge need for follow-up studies, intervention studies and clinical research. The Pemature project met all these needs.

Extremly premature born children are characterized by immaturity in all vital systems, and must be cared for with utmost caution not to inflict harm. Myelinisation of the nervesystem happens in the last trimester where the extremly premature children experiences a considerable influence from the environment. What they experience of loud noises, strong lights and temperature changes can give them life-threatening stress.