Alteraciones lingüísticas en niños con y sin TDAH según subtipo clínico evaluado con la prueba BLOC-S-R

Introduction: acquisition and development of language are complex processes that rely on the chronological development of the child, as well as environmental and social factors.The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) defines the term «language disorder» as the «impaired comprehension and/or use of spoken, written, and/or other symbol systems, including morphology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics».Objective: to compare the speech alterations in children with ADHD by clinical subtype against healthy children with the BLOC-S-R test.Material and methods: the design was observational comparative cross-sectional study.A sample of 156 schoolchildren with ADHD and 111 schoolchildren without ADHD, aged between 7 and 12 years old, from seven public educational institutions, was studied.Prior authorization from the school administrators and signed informed consent from their parents were obtained.A screening test based on the DSM-V was applied to teachers and parents, and those children suspected of having ADHD were further confirmed through neuropsychology, child psychiatry, and psychology services.A group without ADHD was formed with the schoolchildren who were found to not have the condition and met the inclusion criteria.All participants underwent the BLOC-S-R test, and the results were analyzed using SPSS v. 19 software, applying descriptive statistics and χ 2 for comparisons.Results: a total of 267 schoolchildren were studied, of whom 156 were identified as having ADHD and 111 without ADHD.The diagnosed subtypes were 73 (27%) with the combined subtype, 39 (15%) with the inattentive subtype, and 44 (17%) with the hyperactive-impulsive subtype.Out of these, 186 were male and 81 were female, with an average age of 8.2 ± 1.7.Linguistic skills in morphology, syntax, and semantics showed a «T» level of low proficiency, and pragmatics showed an «E» level of very low proficiency in the ADHD group compared to the group without ADHD, who obtained an «S» level of proficiency in all skills.Significant differences were found in all four linguistic skills.Conclusions: school children with ADHD present a greater alteration in the pragmatic language skill, followed by syntax.The scores on linguistic skills of schoolchildren with ADHD evaluated with the BLOC-S-R test are lower compared to the group without ADHD. ResumenIntroducción: la adquisición y el desarrollo del lenguaje son procesos complejos que dependen del desarrollo cronológico del niño, así como de factores ambientales y sociales.