Child-Maltreatment-Research-L (CMRL) List Serve

Message ID: 11461

Date: 2025-07-02

Author:Runyan, Desmond Kimo

Subject:Shaking and Intellectual disability

Colleagues, Our study of intellectual disability among children shaken to discipline them, conceptualized more than 10 years ago, has finally been published. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12889-025-23479-5?utm_source=rct_congratemailt&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=oa_20250702&utm_content=10.1186/s12889-025-23479-5 This project grew out of an observation that more than 44% of mothers in Lucknow, India used shaking as a means of disciplining infants. We designed a case-control study comparing the odds of having been shaken in the first 2 years of life for cases, defined as intellectually disabled (ID) children with no known alternative explanation for the intellectual disability, to matched control children of normal intelligence. The odds were 8.3 greater that the intellectually disabled children had been shaken. This odds ratio generated by a case-control study estimates the increased risk of ID from shaking. We earlier observed, in North Carolina, that the ratio of parent reported shaking was 2.6% and when compared the rate of hospitalized or fatal abusive head trauma of 17/100,000 children in the first two years of life, there were about 150 children shaken for every one who came to medical attention or died from shaking. We wondered about the harms that these children, not brought to medical attention, could have suffered. We hypothesized that a few of these children never seen for medical attention could have suffered long term consequences. "A case-control study is a type of observational study commonly used to look at factors associated with diseases or outcomes.[1] The case-control study starts with a group of cases, which are the individuals who have the outcome of interest. The researcher then tries to construct a second group of individuals called the controls, who are similar to the case individuals but do not have the outcome of interest. The researcher then looks at historical factors to identify if some exposure(s) is/are found more commonly in the cases than the controls. If the exposure is found more commonly in the cases than in the controls, the researcher can hypothesize that the exposure may be linked to the outcome of interest. “ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK448143/ Desmond K. Runyan, MD, DrPH, FAAP Professor Emeritus & Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, The University of Colorado School of Medicine Professor Emeritus and Adjunct Professor of Social Medicine and of Pediatrics, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Tel: (919) 428-1877 Des.Runyan@CUAnschutz.edu drunyan@unc.edu Des.Runyan@gmail.com Desmond K. Runyan, MD, DrPH, FAAP Professor Emeritus & Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, The University of Colorado School of Medicine Professor Emeritus and Adjunct Professor of Social Medicine and of Pediatrics, The Univeristy of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Tel: (919) 428-1877 Des.Runyan@CUAnschutz.edu drunyan@unc.edu Des.Runyan@gmail.com

Colleagues, Our study of intellectual disability among children shaken to discipline them, conceptualized more than 10 years ago, has finally been published. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12889-025-23479-5?utm_source=rct_congratemailt&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=oa_20250702&utm_content=10.1186/s12889-025-23479-5 This project grew out of an observation that more than 44% of mothers in Lucknow, India used shaking as a means of disciplining infants. We designed a case-control study comparing the odds of having been shaken in the first 2 years of life for cases, defined as intellectually disabled (ID) children with no known alternative explanation for the intellectual disability, to matched control children of normal intelligence. The odds were 8.3 greater that the intellectually disabled children had been shaken. This odds ratio generated by a case-control study estimates the increased risk of ID from shaking. We earlier observed, in North Carolina, that the ratio of parent reported shaking was 2.6% and when compared the rate of hospitalized or fatal abusive head trauma of 17/100,000 children in the first two years of life, there were about 150 children shaken for every one who came to medical attention or died from shaking. We wondered about the harms that these children, not brought to medical attention, could have suffered. We hypothesized that a few of these children never seen for medical attention could have suffered long term consequences. "A case-control study is a type of observational study commonly used to look at factors associated with diseases or outcomes.[1] The case-control study starts with a group of cases, which are the individuals who have the outcome of interest. The researcher then tries to construct a second group of individuals called the controls, who are similar to the case individuals but do not have the outcome of interest. The researcher then looks at historical factors to identify if some exposure(s) is/are found more commonly in the cases than the controls. If the exposure is found more commonly in the cases than in the controls, the researcher can hypothesize that the exposure may be linked to the outcome of interest. “ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK448143/ Desmond K. Runyan, MD, DrPH, FAAP Professor Emeritus & Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, The University of Colorado School of Medicine Professor Emeritus and Adjunct Professor of Social Medicine and of Pediatrics, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Tel: (919) 428-1877 Des.RunyanCUAnschutz.edu drunyanunc.edu Des.Runyangmail.com Desmond K. Runyan, MD, DrPH, FAAP Professor Emeritus & Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, The University of Colorado School of Medicine Professor Emeritus and Adjunct Professor of Social Medicine and of Pediatrics, The Univeristy of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Tel: (919) 428-1877 Des.RunyanCUAnschutz.edu drunyanunc.edu Des.Runyangmail.com