Why could prem children be at increased risk for sensory integration problems?
In the womb, a baby spends her time curled up, cozy and warm in the dark, listening to her mother’s heartbeat and muted sounds from the outside world. Meanwhile, her nervous system is developing at astonishing speed, forming thousands upon thousands of essential nerve cell connections. When a baby is born prematurely, her immature, disorganized nervous system isn’t ready to handle all of the sensory messages bombarding her. Most NICUs do their best to minimise over stimulation, but the inevitable beeping and buzzing equipment, room lighting, and busy atmosphere can agitate sensitive prems. Each baby is, of course, totally unique, but in general prems tend to: • be highly sensitive to noise, light, touch, and movement, even beyond the second birthday • retain startle reflexes longer than usual • have muscles that tend to be either stiff or floppy, or a mix of both. • be very distractible and highly active, or extremely quiet and sleep more than expected • have increased risk for vision
