2.32|Gesell Developmental Schedule Evaluation
Certified clinical care physicians with expertise in working with deaf children administered developmental assessments to the study participants. The Gesell Developmental Schedule was a test on development of young children, which has been adopted and used in China for many years (21). It’s used to diagnosis developmental and intelligence problems in children with objective criteria. The test consists of the five domains mentioned below:1. Gross motor such as sitting, walking, and jumping. 2. Fine motor such as eye hand coordination, ability to use small objects. 3. Adaptability such as reaction to moving objects or stimulation. 4. Language such as hearing, comprehension and expressive language capabilities. 5. Social skill such as interactions with people, ability to meet individual needs(22).The physicians selected the most appropriate test item of the Gesell development schedule for the child depending on their ages. By ascertaining whether or not the children were displaying the appropriate behavior for the age, an individual’s developmental quotient (DQ) was calculated(22). According to the DQ, the developmental level can be graded into normal (more than 85 score), suspicious (76-85 score), mild neurological damage (55-75 score), moderate (40-54 score), severe (25-39 score) and very severe (less than 25 score) neurological damage (22,23). Overall DQ and above five domains’ DQ were adopted in this study and the above grading criteria were applied for all domain’s development.