More than 400,000 child development screenings were performed in the past year, discovering more than 25,000 suspected developmental delays, since the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) launched the screening service for children younger than seven on July 1 last year, the agency said yesterday.
A four-year-old girl nicknamed Hsiao-an (小安) appeared to be growing normally, but her mother observed that she often had mood swings and would easily lose her temper, such as bursting out crying when playing with blocks, scribble frantically when trying to draw and often fall down when walking.
Pediatrician Mai Jian-fang (麥建方) said after receiving a child development screening, Hsiao-an was evaluated to have normal language and social development, but struggled with certain behaviors such as hopping on one leg, cutting paper with scissors and drawing, and was suspected to have fine motor skill delays.
Photo: Lin Chih-yi, Taipei Times
After Hsiao-an was referred to an interdisciplinary assessment center for child development, she was confirmed to have hand-eye coordination issues because she had a significant difference in eyesight between her two eyes — up to four diopters, he said.
The girl’s motor skills and mood swings improved rapidly after she was proscribed corrective glasses and rehabilitation, he added.
The service offers six screening sessions per child before they reach the age of seven to assess gross motor skills, fine motor skills, language development and social development.
As of the end of last month, a total of 402,594 screenings were conducted in the past year, finding more than 25,000 suspected developmental delay cases — or 6.3 percent of the total — and also about 63,000 cases that needed follow-up and healthcare instructions, HPA Director-General Wu Chao-chun (吳昭軍) said.
The screenings were conducted by more than 2,600 pediatricians, family doctors and doctors in the Holistic Physicians for Young Children program at more than 1,200 healthcare facilities across the nation, the HPA said.
HPA official Lin Yu-hsuan (林宇旋) said most of the suspected development delay cases struggled in language and cognitive skills, accounting for 75.6 percent, followed by social development at 29 percent, fine motor skills at 28.8 percent, and gross motor skills at 17.3 percent.
Doctors refer them to an interdisciplinary assessment center for child development, with the number of centers increasing from 52 in 2022 to 88 this year, including 17 designated key hospitals that are not allowed to reject referred cases, Wu said.
The centers are required to let the referred cases book an assessment appointment within 30 days and provide a comprehensive assessment report to the HPA within 45 days, he said, adding that the compliance rate was more than 90 percent last year and hopefully it would reach 100 percent this year.
Mackay Memorial Hospital Child Intervention and Developmental Assessment Center director Chen Hui-ju (陳慧如) said sometimes the assessment of development delay is very complicated, demanding professional knowledge and time.
As many centers are established in hospitals, and many are facing a shortage of healthcare workers, she hopes the government can provide more resources to help retain workers and ensure high-quality assessments, she said.
The HPA recommends three steps for parents to follow — first, refer to the Children’s Health Handbook (兒童健康手冊) and make daily observations of their child’s development; second, use the six screening services according to the recommended schedule; and third, if the child is suspected to have developmental delays, get an assessment at interdisciplinary
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
Taiwan's first indigenous defense submarine, the SS-711 Hai Kun (海鯤, or Narwhal), departed for its 13th sea trial at 7am today, marking its seventh submerged test, with delivery to the navy scheduled for July. The outing also marked its first sea deployment since President William Lai (賴清德) boarded the submarine for an inspection on March 19, drawing a crowd of military enthusiasts who gathered to show support. The submarine this morning departed port accompanied by CSBC Corp’s Endeavor Manta (奮進魔鬼魚號) uncrewed surface vessel and a navy M109 assault boat. Amid public interest in key milestones such as torpedo-launching operations and overnight submerged trials,
RSS