Methods: 133 Newborn infants admitted longer than 3 days to private-sector neonatal intensive care units were enrolled. 113 of these parents were contacted when their infants were 6-months corrected-age. They completed the ASQ (n=60) and the PEDS® COMBINED (n=65) questionnaires at home. Returned questionnaires were compared using an in-subject design. Concordance between the questionnaires was determined with the kappa coefficient (κ) and Test of Symmetry.
Results: Concordance between the ASQ and PEDS® COMBINED was 90.7% (κ = 0.82, ρ = 0.05).
The ASQ and PEDS® COMBINED identified 40% and 42% of the cohort with developmental concerns. The ASQ and PEDS® COMBINED showed excellent interrater agreement, identifying the same infants requiring further developmental assessment. When there was discordance, it was non-significant in the direction of the ASQ being more likely to identify an infant as delayed overall and statistically significant in the direction of the PEDS® COMBINED being more likely to identify communication delays (ρ = 0.01)
Conclusions: The ASQ and PEDS® COMBINED identify the same infants with developmental concerns. The PEDS® COMBINED is more sensitive to communication delays.