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Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders When School Closures Were Lifted

Human activities have been changing in conjunction with the status of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, with school closures and activity cancellations becoming commonplace. As such, the COVID-19 pandemic likely also has had a detrimental impact on the behavioral problems of children...

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Autores principales: Suzuki, Kota, Hiratani, Michio
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8711599/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34966705
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fped.2021.789045
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author Suzuki, Kota
Hiratani, Michio
author_facet Suzuki, Kota
Hiratani, Michio
author_sort Suzuki, Kota
collection PubMed
description Human activities have been changing in conjunction with the status of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, with school closures and activity cancellations becoming commonplace. As such, the COVID-19 pandemic likely also has had a detrimental impact on the behavioral problems of children with neurodevelopmental disorders (NDD). In Japan, the government issued a stay-at-home order causing children to stop participating in school activities following the first declaration of a state of emergency (April 7 to May 25, 2020). During winter 2020, the stay-at-home order and school closures were lifted. Using longitudinal data of children with NDD, we compared the behavioral problems of children with NDD between October 1 and December 31, 2020 (i.e., winter 2020) with their behavioral problems before the COVID-19 pandemic (pre-COVID-19). In this study, 143 caregivers of children with NDD evaluated their behavioral problems using the Japanese version of the Aberrant Behavior Checklist (ABC-J) in the pre-COVID-19 period and winter 2020. We found no scores that were higher in winter 2020 compared to pre-COVID-19. Moreover, irritability and hyperactivity scores were significantly lower in winter 2020 compared to pre-COVID-19. These findings suggest weak negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the behavioral problems of children with NDD. In schools and clinical practice, children learned knowledge about COVID-19 and related preventive behaviors. Therefore, these practices may have alleviated the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on children with NDD.
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spelling pubmed-87115992021-12-28 Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders When School Closures Were Lifted Suzuki, Kota Hiratani, Michio Front Pediatr Pediatrics Human activities have been changing in conjunction with the status of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, with school closures and activity cancellations becoming commonplace. As such, the COVID-19 pandemic likely also has had a detrimental impact on the behavioral problems of children with neurodevelopmental disorders (NDD). In Japan, the government issued a stay-at-home order causing children to stop participating in school activities following the first declaration of a state of emergency (April 7 to May 25, 2020). During winter 2020, the stay-at-home order and school closures were lifted. Using longitudinal data of children with NDD, we compared the behavioral problems of children with NDD between October 1 and December 31, 2020 (i.e., winter 2020) with their behavioral problems before the COVID-19 pandemic (pre-COVID-19). In this study, 143 caregivers of children with NDD evaluated their behavioral problems using the Japanese version of the Aberrant Behavior Checklist (ABC-J) in the pre-COVID-19 period and winter 2020. We found no scores that were higher in winter 2020 compared to pre-COVID-19. Moreover, irritability and hyperactivity scores were significantly lower in winter 2020 compared to pre-COVID-19. These findings suggest weak negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the behavioral problems of children with NDD. In schools and clinical practice, children learned knowledge about COVID-19 and related preventive behaviors. Therefore, these practices may have alleviated the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on children with NDD. Frontiers Media S.A. 2021-12-13 /pmc/articles/PMC8711599/ /pubmed/34966705 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fped.2021.789045 Text en Copyright © 2021 Suzuki and Hiratani. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Pediatrics
Suzuki, Kota
Hiratani, Michio
Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders When School Closures Were Lifted
title Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders When School Closures Were Lifted
title_full Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders When School Closures Were Lifted
title_fullStr Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders When School Closures Were Lifted
title_full_unstemmed Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders When School Closures Were Lifted
title_short Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders When School Closures Were Lifted
title_sort impact of the covid-19 pandemic on children with neurodevelopmental disorders when school closures were lifted
topic Pediatrics
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8711599/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34966705
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fped.2021.789045
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