Iron deficiency anaemia and child development.

A developmental test was carried out to evaluate the effect of iron deficiency anaemia on child development by using Bailey Scale of Infant Development (BSID) and Enjoji Scale of Infant Analytical development (ESID). The subjects were 54 children, divided into three groups. Group 1 consisted of 15 infants with anaemia; Group 2: 10 infants with a past history of anaemia and Group 3: 29 healthy normal infants without anaemia formed the control group. The characteristics of infants and their family background were not different among the three groups except for the male/female ratio. The mean mental developmental index (MDI) and psychomotor developmental index (PDI) of Group 1 and Group 2 were lower than that of control group using the BSID test. The mean speech development quotients of Group 1 and Group 2 were lower than that of control group in ESID. These tendencies were observed after subjects were stratified by sex. Therefore, the results of the study suggests that iron deficiency anaemia may affect child development especially speech development.