Follow-up visit to International Adoption Clinic

July 6th Lukas had his regular visit to Kennedy Krieger's International Adoption Clinic. Overall Dr. Davoli was very pleased. Lukas is now testing pretty much at his age level. When he first arrived home and had is initial visit at age 3 1/2 he was testing between age 2 and 3. Six months later at age 4 he was doing better at a ge 2 1/2- 3 1/2 but still behind and classified as mild developmental delay. He is now clearly testing at normal intelligence. His language scores are still testing all over the place but his average score has increased from 60th percentile to 80th percentile.

His physical growth is still improving exponentially as well. He started out not even on the growth chart at the first visit and is now in 17th percentile for weight and 19th percentile for height. That is a 10 percent improvement from 6 months ago. His head circumference is at 40th percentile. He is still on the small side for his age but still growing at a fast pace.

She took a gander at his ears and doesn't feel the inner ear issue is affecting his language skills. She recommended we see the pediatrician or an ENT for follow-up. She said some doctors will just wait it out and see if the fluid dries up, some will prescribe meds to help dry them out or in severe cases recommend tubes. She didn't feel his were bad enough to warrant tubes at this time.

So we will see her again in 6 months. She is scheduling an appointment with a language specialist for the fall because she feels his language deficits may be to subtle at that point for her to be able to detect them at that point. Since he tests all over the board on langauge we felt it was important to keep a close eye on it so it doesn't create a problem when he start kindergarten a year from now.

His reward was a visit to his eastern shore grandparent's to swim and play on the farm for the rest of the week.

Making good progress

Lukas had is first follow-up (5 months)appointment with the IA Clinic. The IA doctor he sees is quite pleased with his progress. His cognitive development and language development are both increasing faster than his biological age. He is pretty much on target for physical and cognitive development (from 67% to 75%)but is still about a year behind in language(47% to 54%). He's jumped 6% in wt and 7% in height on the growth chart since coming home. His head circumference has even jumped 2 growth curves which the doc claims they say it can't but she sees it all the time. It is hard to believe that in 5 months he has gone being more like a 2 1/2 year old to the 4 year old that he is suppose to be.

Visit to Dr. Davoli at JHU Kennedy Krieger International Adoption Clinic

Yesterday we took Lukas for is initial developmental evaluation at the Kennedy Krieger International Adoption Clinic. The staff there were all wonderful and Lukas hit it off very well with Dr. Davoli. She assures us that he seems to have attached to us nicely and is in excellent condition. Her official assessment is that he appears to be at 21 months for language skills and 30 months for cognitive skills which she felt was perfectly normal for his background. So basically, she has him at about a 2 1/2 year old which is about where I thought he was at. She feels very confident that he will catch up within about a year to year and half. As for his stature she said we should know by 6-9 months if he is small from being in the babyhouse or if he is genetically small.

We were allowed to stay in the room for the assessment. She started out with some simple tasks with pegs and blocks and he started doing them before she even told him what she wanted him to do. So he sailed through the cognitive tests for toddlers. They did some drawing tasks and he was a first for her. She drew a striaght line and asked him to do the same. He drew his perpendicular to hers instead of parallel. She tried several times and he always did the same thing. He was better at circles.

She told us we were doing a good job and to keep doing the things we were doing. Reading, talking, music and interacting with him to help his language skills. She did recommend that we consider signing him up with Child Find in Carroll County to work on catching him up on his language skills. It is Federally mandated that children with disabilities or at risk for learning disabilities get free Early Childhood Intervention services. I believe it is part of the "No Child Left Behind" program. She felt the 3 yr old class was appropriate for him but that we might want to supplement with resources from Child Find to help get him up to his actual age level in language and development.

We go back in January for a follow-up visit and to see how he is progressing.

Lukas made another milestone over the weekend by being able to ride his trike in the court area by himself. He struggles a little getting it moving going up the slight inclines but insists on doing it himself. For now we have removed the push stick but will still need it if we go for a ride through the neighborhood due to the big hills.

Thanks for following along,
The Robeys