How common is cerebral palsy?
How common is cerebral palsy?
About 1 in 500 babies born in the UK have cerebral palsy. The number of cases per year (the incidence) has not changed much over the last 50 years or so. The health and care of mothers has improved in this time and some causes of cerebral palsy have decreased. However, more and more babies that are born prematurely are surviving and a proportion of these will have cerebral palsy. This, together with the fact that the cause in most cases is not known, is why it is thought that the overall incidence of cerebral palsy has not changed much in the last 50 years or so.
How is cerebral palsy diagnosed?
Most cases of cerebral palsy are not diagnosed at birth. Babies with severe cerebral palsy may have signs at birth that are obvious such as severely abnormal muscle tone. However, most children with cerebral palsy are diagnosed between the ages of six months and two years. The first thing that is usually noticed is that a child is not developing at the normal rate. Also, the muscles tone may feel abnormal, or the baby may start to have abnormal movements.
As a rough guide, a child with normal development will be usually be able to:
- Sit unaided at six months.
- Crawl by eight months.
- Pull to stand by 12 months.
- Walk by 15 months.
There are variations, and some babies are normal 'late developers'. However, a child who is late in these developmental milestones should be assessed for cerebral palsy. The diagnosis can usually be made by a child specialist from the symptoms, signs and delay in development.
Additional tests such as a brain scan may be done.
Other problems associated with cerebral palsy
In some cases, the damage to the brain affects other aspects of brain function in addition to problems with muscles.
Roughly, about half of children with cerebral palsy have some degree of learning difficulty. The severity can vary. (The other half will have normal intelligence or above.). About half of children with cerebral palsy will have some degree of speech problem. Sometimes a child with difficulty in speaking may be thought of as having low intelligence, whereas in fact they have normal or high intelligence. About 1 in 3 people with cerebral palsy will also have epilepsy. Some children also have problems with hearing, vision, eating and drinking.
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