Developmental coordination disorder
Definition
Developmental coordination disorder is a childhood disorder that leads to poor coordination and clumsiness.
Causes, incidence, and risk factors
About 6% of school-age children have some kind of developmental coordination disorder. Children with this disorder may:
Have trouble holding objects
Have an unsteady walk
Run into other children
Trip over their own feet
Developmental coordination disorder may occur alone or with other learning disorders, such as communication disorders or disorder of written expression.
Symptoms
Children with developmental coordination disorder have difficulties with motor coordination compared to other children the same age. Some common symptoms include:
Clumsiness
Delays in sitting up, crawling, and walking
Problems with sucking and swallowing during first year of life
Problems with gross motor coordination (for example, jumping, hopping, or standing on one foot)
Problems with fine motor coordination (for example, writing, using scissors, tying shoelaces, or tapping one finger to another)
Signs and tests
Physical causes and other types of learning disabilities must be ruled out before the diagnosis can be confirmed.
Complications
Learning problems
Low self-esteem resulting from poor ability at sports and teasing by other children
Repeated injuries
Weight gain as a result of not wanting to participate in physical activities (such as sports)
Treatments
The HandTutor system has been shown to improve fine motor movement ability in patients with DCD.
