This is the first volume in a new series entitled Child Health and Development. Published on the occasion of the International Year of Disabled Persons, it aims to provide an up-to-date overview of handicapping conditions in childhood. Sixteen articles, in English or French, are included; each concludes with a summary in the other language. The authorsrepresent eight countries, seven of them European.
In the three sections, articles deal with such topics as developmental screening, perinatal intensive care, sensory handicaps, prenatal diagnosis, support systems for families, and educational and social integration of handicapped children into the mainstream. None attempts to be comprehensive, and most keep statistics to a minimum (a good thing, because figures for incidence and prevalence of handicaps are difficult to compare between countries).
Some important questions are addressed. For example, Leo Stern of Brown University (Providence, RI) points out that improvements in perinatal intensive care that result in