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Query: UMLS:C0025362 (mental retardation)
 15,878 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Child abuse by whiplash-shaking can lead to severe cerebral damage, neurological defects and mental retardation. Cerebral damage has been found with and without external evidence of head injury. We report the sonographic findings in two children after traumatization due to repetitive vigorous whiplash shaking. Cerebral sonography revealed cerebral edema at admission or within 48 hours thereafter. Follow-up studies demonstrated development of marked brain atrophy in both cases. The sonographic findings were confirmed by cranial computerized tomography. Doppler sonography was used to monitor cerebral perfusion by measuring intracranial blood flow. The clinical history of the patients demonstrates that cerebral sonography in combination with Doppler sonography not only serves as a diagnostic tool but also allows adjustment of therapy to the actual clinical status of the patient.
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PMID:Battered child syndrome: cerebral ultrasound and CT findings after vigorous shaking. 140 84

While there has been increased attention placed upon the inadequacy of parenting by persons with mental retardation, such attention does little to increase our understanding of the complexities of parenting. A refocusing of research and intervention efforts is needed to examine the concomitants of adequacy of parenting. What we know about both the inadequacy as well as the adequacy of parenting by persons with mental retardation and the limitations of the information upon which we base these statements is reviewed. New foci are suggested in understanding both adequacy and the inadequacy of parenting by persons with mental retardation.
Child Abuse Negl 1992
PMID:Predicting adequacy of parenting by people with mental retardation. 155 66

The aim of this study was to develop methods, categories, and criteria for investigating and evaluating parental functioning and potential and to relate the accuracy of such categories to prognosis. A case analysis, a predictive study, and a follow-up study of 17 abused and/or neglected children was conducted 5-6 years later. Categories were developed and cases analyzed for stress factors in childhood, youth, and early adult life and for factors related to social network, finances, work, accommodation, pregnancy, and marriage. The cases were also analyzed with regard to the following dimensions: immaturity, emotional problems, psychosis, mental retardation, alcohol and drugs. Seven areas of parental functioning were scored on a 4-point scale. The child's role and the effect of parents' unresolved problems upon the parent-child interaction were also studied. The findings of this study, limited though it is in scope, suggest that the prognosis for abusive and/or neglectful parents is poorer when they are scored high on immaturity than when they are scored high on emotional problems.
Child Abuse Negl 1991
PMID:A predictive and follow-up study of abusive and neglectful families by case analysis. 204 77

There is growing recognition that children, adolescents, and adults who are mentally retarded are particularly vulnerable to sexual abuse and exploitation and are in need of intervention services. These people are especially vulnerable due to ther often life-long dependence on caregivers, relatively powerless position in society, emotional and social insecurities, and lack of education regarding sexuality and sexual abuse. In addition the mental health functioning and emotional development of individuals who are mentally retarded are not well understood, and many professionals remain uneducated about their mental health needs. To work effectively with this population, mental health professionals and educators must be alert to what is known about the sexual abuse and exploitation of persons with mental retardation. Furthermore, they need to become educated about the rights of these persons to special legal protection from abuse and neglect and to appropriate and effective mental health interventions. The challenge for mental health professionals and educators is to protect persons who are mentally retarded from sexual abuse and exploitation, to provide appropriate psychotherapeutic interventions when abuse occurs, to respect their right to developmentally appropriate knowledge about sexuality and sexual abuse, and to allow for the fulfillment of their sexuality.
Child Abuse Negl 1990
PMID:Sexual abuse and exploitation of children and adults with mental retardation and other handicaps. 220 99

Mothers with mental retardation with or without a history of child abuse and/or neglect were compared on a number of demographic variables. The reasons why children were or were not removed also were examined. The demographic comparisons showed that while those mothers with such a history generally had higher IQs, they were similar to the mothers without such a history. Twice as many of those with a history of abuse and/or neglect were married, lived independently, and had at least two children, one of which often had problems, in comparison to those without such a history. Examination of the reasons for child removal showed that removal occurred if the mother had a problem in addition to her retardation or if she was unwilling to attend and actively participate in a training program and/or did not have someone who could provide support. If a mother was willing and did attend training and had support, children were either not removed initially or were returned upon evidence that the mother was actively participating. In comparison to those mothers with a history of abuse and/or neglect, those without such a history functioned at a lower intellectual and functional level and were living with a relative who shared child-care responsibilities.
Child Abuse Negl 1990
PMID:Mothers with mental retardation who do or do not abuse or neglect their children. 220

The study is a 12-year follow-up of all risk-children (652) and a random sample of control-children (626) born during 1968 in a delimited geographical area (Aarhus county). Information from the infancy period was obtained from the health nurses' schematic records and were concerned with family background variables, life events which had occurred during the first year of life, perinatal risk-factors and indices of health care during the first year of life. Information at 12 years of age was obtained through the records in the school health service. Multivariate predictor analyses were performed. Significant educational difficulties, which 16.6% experienced, were pronouncedly predicted from indices of low socio-economic status, child abuse and neglect and male sex. The prevalences at 12 years of age of mental disorders psychosomatic (6.7%), behaviour disorder (3.3%), and mental retardation (1.3%) were predictable from indices of social and psychosocial stress including the health nurses' assessment of inadequate care during infancy period, but with some differences among the diagnostic groups. The results show that unfavourable social factors, psychosocial stress and inadequate care are informative variables for delimitation of risk-groups in infancy.
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PMID:Prediction of educational achievement, behaviour and health at school using information from infancy health service. 372 25

Child abuse by whiplash-shaking can lead to severe injury in infants, including cerebral damage, neurological defects, blindness, and mental retardation. These findings are seen often without external evidence of head injury. Nurses should suspect shaken baby syndrome (SBS) in infants less than 1 year of age who present with apnea, seizures, lethargy or drowsiness, bradycardia, respiratory difficulty, coma, or death. Subdural and retinal hemorrhages accompanied by the absence of external signs of trauma are hallmarks of the syndrome.
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PMID:Shaken baby syndrome: a nursing perspective. 771 67

This study examined the effect of mental retardation and an adolescent girl's behavior on adult women's perceptions of sexual abuse and the girl's responsibility. Subjects were 288 women, age 18 to 33, who were randomly assigned a vignette describing a sexual encounter between an adolescent girl and boy. Girl's diagnosis (mentally retarded or nonretarded), boy's diagnosis (mentally retarded or nonretarded) and girl's behavior (encouraging, passive, or resisting) were experimentally manipulated. Factor analysis of responses yielded three factors: girl's responsibility, boy's abusiveness, and parents' responsibility. Results indicate that subjects perceive the girl's responsibility differently among girls with and without mental retardation. Regardless of her behavior, subjects perceive the girl as bearing little responsibility when she is retarded. However, when she is nonretarded, she bears more responsibility when she is encouraging than when she is passive or resisting, and she bears greater responsibility when she is passive than when she is resisting. Also, when the girl is encouraging, the boy's perceived sexual abusiveness is less when he is mentally retarded than when he is nonretarded. Finally, parents are assigned greatest responsibility when the girl is passive, regardless of her diagnosis.
Child Abuse Negl 1994 Oct
PMID:Mental retardation and adult women's perceptions of adolescent sexual abuse. 780 88

Studies assessing the quality of parenting provided by adults with mental retardation present conflicting conclusions. Some consider the majority to be doing reasonably well, whilst others report frequently unsatisfactory caretaking. There are a number of reasons for such different views. First, inconsistent selection criteria make it hard to compare across studies. In particular, sample composition will be influenced by the recruitment source. For example, if parents have been chosen from voluntary educational programmes a rather different picture is likely to be found than if they have been selected from individuals known to, or referred by, statutory agencies. On the whole, authors working with subjects from the former source have been rather more optimistic than those working with parents referred because there were already serious concerns about parenting difficulties or about delayed child development. Secondly, the majority of studies have used poorly defined global measures of parenting, with variable criteria of what constitutes adequate care. Some have concentrated on physical care and hygiene, whilst others have looked for the presence of affection and warmth. A child's reception into care as the sole measure of the quality of parenting is an unsatisfactory criterion because parental retardation has itself occasionally been used as the basis for removal of a child into care, even in the absence of other evidence of neglect or abuse. Thirdly, methodological flaws are found in studies that have used observational assessments of parenting. Such studies have suggested mothers with mental retardation tend to lack interactive skills (such as high levels of praise and imitation, and low restrictiveness) which are known to be associated with optimal child development. Control groups have often not been matched on social and other variables which might be expected to exert a significant influence upon parenting practices. In addition, the generalisability of these observational studies is open to question as parenting style has been adduced from brief play sessions, lasting at the most 10 minutes. The extent to which mothers with mental retardation play spontaneously with their children at home in a stimulating and age-appropriate fashion has not been measured. With regard to the evidence on abuse and neglect, questions have been raised about whether the children of parents with mental retardation are at increased risk. This problem has rarely been addressed in a methodologically satisfactory way. First, most studies have drawn their samples from referrals to medical or psychiatric departments. Secondly, as indicated earlier, reception into care cannot by itself be taken to be an indicator of child abuse.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)
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PMID:Parenting provided by adults with mental retardation. 842 Oct 68

Dehydration in developed countries is an uncommon but important mechanism resulting in the death of infants and children. The clinicopathological features of a series of 37 fatal dehydration cases autopsied at the Adelaide Children's Hospital over a 33-year period (1961-1993) are presented. Causative factors for dehydration included gastroenteritis (21 cases), gastroenteritis with high environmental temperature (one case), high environmental temperatures (six cases), neglect/failure to thrive (four cases), mental retardation/chromosomal abnormality (three cases), congenital adrenal hyperplasia (one case), and unsuspected cystic fibrosis (one case). The mean age at death was 11.4 months (range 2 weeks to 6.25 years; median 6 months; 95% confidence interval 6 months to 1 year and 4 months; male-to-female ratio, 19:18). Sixteen of the 22 cases of fatal gastroenteritis (73%) occurred during the fall/winter months (March to August). There were a total of seven aboriginal or part aboriginal children in the group (19%). Children with mental retardation were at higher risk of dehydration, and previously unsuspected cases of child abuse/neglect also presented with lethal dehydration. Vitreous humor electrolyte levels and immunoassay for rotavirus were useful diagnostic adjuncts.
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PMID:Dehydration deaths in infants and young children. 883 76


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