Life expectancy in cerebral palsy

an update

Strauss, David PhD FASA
Brooks, Jordan BS
Rosenbloom, Lewis FRCPCH
Shavelle, Robert PhD FAACPDM

Life Expectancy Project, San Francisco, CA, USA (Brooks)
Royal Liverpool Children's NHS Trust, Liverpool, UK (Rosenbloom)
Life Expectancy Project, San Francisco, CA, USA. (Shavelle)

^*Correspondence to the first author at 1439 – 17th Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94122, USA. E-mail: [email protected]

See end of paper for list of abbreviations.

List of abbreviations: FBO: Fed by others; SF: Self-feeds; TF: Tube fed;

Accepted for publication 19th December 2007.

Developmental Medicine & Child Neurology 50(7):p 487-493, July 2008.

This paper clarifies and updates some issues of life expectancy in cerebral palsy. These are: (1) the definition of life expectancy and how it is calculated; (2) the secular trends that have occurred since the data for the 1998 paper were collected; (3) revised estimates reflecting improvements of some of the analytical methods and statistics provided in that paper; (4) comparison of life expectancies among countries; (5) issues regarding quality of care; and (6) consideration of prospective life expectations in addition to current life expectancy.