Socioeconomic disparities and difficulties to access to healthcare services among Canadian children with neurodevelopmental disorders and disabilities.

Objectives: The aims of this study were to identify the associations of levels of severity of neurodevelopmental disorders and disabilities (NDD/D) in children with their household socioeconomic status (SES) and their frequency of visits to a healthcare provider, and to examine how the severity of disability varied with these determinants among NDD/D subgroups, in order to inform possible social policy changes and to improve access to the healthcare system.

Methods: Data from the 2006 Participation and Activity Limitation Survey on children aged 5-14 years, collected by Statistics Canada, were analyzed (n=7,072 and weighted n=340,340). Children with NDD/D constituted those with impairments in motor, speech, neurosensory, and psychological functioning, as well as those who had issues with learning/cognition and social interactions.

Classification of upper limb disability levels of children with spastic unilateral cerebral palsy using K-means algorithm.

Treatment for cerebral palsy depends upon the severity of the child's condition and requires knowledge about upper limb disability. The aim of this study was to develop a systematic quantitative classification method of the upper limb disability levels for children with spastic unilateral cerebral palsy based on upper limb movements and muscle activation. Thirteen children with spastic unilateral cerebral palsy and six typically developing children participated in this study.