Description of perinatal adversities in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

Background: Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is the most common neurodevelopmental disorder. According to literature data, perinatal adversities might be associated with the occurrence of ADHD, but the results are inconclusive at the moment. The aim of the present study is to describe perinatal adversities in children with ADHD.

Methods: The data of children in County Fejér Pedagogical Service in three consecutive school years (2012-2015) was analyzed. In the present sample, 219 children with special education needs were diagnosed with ADHD (age: 9.0 years, SD: 3.1 years; 36 girls). The diagnosis was based on ICD-10 criteria. The present analysis is restricted to the presence of preterm birth, complicated/prolonged labor, intrauterine hypoxia and birth asphyxia in children with ADHD from different areas (central, urban or rural) of the county. Logistic regression analysis was performed to assess the effects of gender, age was used as a covariate.

Results: Within this sample, the presence of complicated/prolonged labor was significantly lower (OR: 0.378, p<0.039) in girls compared to boys. The other studied variables did not show significant differences regarding gender. Intrauterine hypoxia was registered in 28 cases, while birth asphyxia was registered in 15 cases. The presence of preterm birth was 8.7%, and showed distinctive differences according to living area (central: 3.6% vs rural: 11.3%).

Conclusions: Our results indicate the importance of registering perinatal complications and long term follow up of these children in the direction of neurodevelopmental disorders, however a limitation of the present study is the lack of a control group.