Characteristic

Having a baby who is born healthy and perfect is certainly the hope of all parents. Even so, sometimes there are several conditions that make babies have defects at birth. Of the various types of birth defects in babies, Down syndrome or Down syndrome is one of them. In this Down syndrome condition, what are the characteristics that are seen in babies? To be clearer, know the symptoms of Down syndrome or Down syndrome.

What are the characteristics of Down syndrome?

Down syndrome or Down syndrome is a genetic disorder caused by an additional baby having a copy of the 21st chromome. This birth defect condition causes the baby to experience delays in the baby's physical, mental, and intellectual development.

Even though they often look similar, in fact every baby and child with Down syndrome has a physical and mental condition that is not always the same.

In fact, the symptoms or characteristics of Down syndrome or Down syndrome can vary for each baby and child. Various symptoms or characteristics of Down syndrome or Down syndrome, namely:

Symptoms or physical characteristics in Down syndrome babies

The physical characteristics of Down syndrome in different babies and children can vary. However, the general symptoms of Down syndrome are as follows:

• Flat face and nose
• Small head
• Short neck with excess skin on the back
• Poor muscle tone or not functioning properly
• Small head, ears and mouth size
• Upward sloping eyes accompanied by a fold of skin that protrudes from the upper eyelid and covers the inner corner of the eye (palpebral fissure)
• White spots on the colored parts of the eyes (called Brushfield spots)
• Wide hand with short fingers
• Small hand and foot size
• There is a deep indentation on the first toe and second toe

In addition, according to the National Institute of Health, symptoms of physical development in infants and children with Down syndrome tend to be slower.

This is of course inversely proportional to the condition of babies and children who do not have Down syndrome. Take for example, because the condition of your little one's muscle tone is not good, babies with Down syndrome are generally late in learning various developments.

Babies with symptoms of Down syndrome or Down syndrome can experience delays in learning to crawl, sit alone, stand without holding on, and can walk.

Apart from these various developmental delays, babies and children who experience symptoms of Down syndrome can still have normal activities.

Indeed, the physical characteristics or symptoms experienced by infants and children with Down syndrome or Down syndrome make their development take a little longer.

However, in the end babies and children with Down syndrome can still reach the milestones for optimal development.

Symptoms or intellectual features in Down syndrome babies

Intellectual is the ability to think or intelligence that is owned by a person. Babies and children with Down syndrome or Down syndrome generally do experience features or symptoms of cognitive impairment and problems in thinking.

However, these cognitive problems usually range from mild to moderate levels and are rarely associated with severe cognitive impairment.

Some of the symptoms of cognitive and behavioral disorders commonly experienced by infants and children with Down syndrome are as follows:

• Time to pay attention to something tends to be short
• Behavior tends to be impulsive
• A little late in learning something
• The development of speech and language development of infants is slower

In detail, here are some problems related to intellectual development that babies and children with Down syndrome symptoms can experience:

Delay in motor development

When the baby's motor development is late, it can affect other things. Various motoric developments include learning to move, learning to roll, learning to crawl, learning to sit, and learning to walk even if it's a little late.

In this condition, the delays in motor development above can affect the development of cognitive abilities, language, and so on. Whether it's gross motor development or fine motor development.

Delays in speech and language development

According to the Mayo Clinic, the communication and language skills of babies with Down syndrome characteristics can also be hampered. It is the same with other intellectual developments.

Infants and children with Down syndrome symptoms just need longer to develop speech and language skills.

Delay in the development of recognizing numbers

Most babies and children with Down syndrome or Down syndrome symptoms tend to have difficulty understanding numbers.

But again, the late development of this ability will still be achieved by your little one even though he is not at the same age as his peers.

Delay in development of verbal short-term memory

Short-term memory is a memory system related to information that is only learned for a short period of time.

This short-term memory helps support the baby's learning process and cognitive ability to process visual and verbal information.

Infants and children with Down syndrome features or symptoms tend to be better able to process information obtained visually than verbally.

Mental symptoms in Down syndrome babies

Other characteristics or symptoms in infants and children with Down syndrome or Down syndrome are mental related.

Some babies and children with this birth defect can also have problems with behavior, find it difficult to pay attention to things, to be interested in several things.

This is because babies and children with Down syndrome symptoms have difficulty controlling themselves. Whether it's related to their own feelings or towards other people.

When to see a doctor

The condition of Down's syndrome birth defects in babies can usually be diagnosed during pregnancy and after birth.

However, if you have any questions regarding your current pregnancy or your little one's development, please consult your doctor further.

No exception if you observe your little one has one or more symptoms related to Down syndrome, do not delay to see a doctor.

As previously explained, the symptoms or characteristics of Down syndrome, aka Down syndrome, can affect the baby's development process.

This includes the development of the baby in thinking, talking, understanding something, to socializing with people in the environment.

Babies with Down syndrome do take longer to reach each development milestone.

However, you don't really need to worry because babies and children with Down syndrome will still develop gradually.

This development will usually go along with getting older even though not at the same age as their peers.

Your baby with this condition also usually needs extra help to learn to develop his skills.

However, regardless of the symptoms experienced by infants and children with Down syndrome or Down syndrome, early treatment is key.

By providing proper treatment, medical problems and various development of babies and children with Down syndrome can be much better.

This will also help your baby to live a better life later.

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