Language and Cognitive Outcomes Following Ischemic Stroke in Children With Monolingual and Bilingual Exposure.

Although many children who experience ischemic stroke come from bilingual backgrounds, it is unclear whether bilingual exposure affects poststroke development. Our research evaluates bilingual and monolingual exposure on linguistic/cognitive development poststroke across 3 stroke-onset groups. An institutional stroke registry and medical charts were used to gather data on 237 children across 3 stroke-onset groups: neonatal, <28 days; first-year, 28 days to 12 months; and childhood, 13 months to 18 years. The Pediatric Stroke Outcome Measure (PSOM), administered several times poststroke, was used to evaluate cognition and linguistic development. Similar cognitive outcomes were observed across language groups. However, an interaction effect with stroke-onset group was observed, with monolinguals in the first-year group having worse productive language outcomes as compared to bilinguals. Overall, no detrimental effects of bilingualism were found on children's poststroke cognition and linguistic development. Our study suggests that a bilingual environment may facilitate language development in children poststroke.