Human Development and Pediatric Health Conditions
What the exam expects
You must connect typical developmental trajectories to the conditions that disrupt them. Know gross-motor milestones (head control ~3-4 months, independent sitting ~6-8 months, walking ~12 months with a wide normal range), fine-motor progression (palmar to pincer grasp), and the sequence of language and social milestones. Understand how prematurity shifts expectations: use corrected age until roughly 2 years.
Conditions to master
Cerebral palsy (know the GMFCS levels and the difference between spastic, dyskinetic, and ataxic types), Down syndrome (hypotonia, atlantoaxial instability precautions, early Alzheimer risk in adulthood), spina bifida (level of lesion predicts function; latex allergy and shunt monitoring), muscular dystrophy (Duchenne: proximal weakness, Gowers sign, cardiomyopathy, steroid effects), and acquired conditions such as traumatic brain injury, cancer, and juvenile idiopathic arthritis. Also know normal variants versus red flags.
Traps
Questions love to test whether you recognize a milestone as delayed versus a variant, and whether a precaution (e.g., cervical spine in Down syndrome, latex in spina bifida) changes your plan. Another trap: attributing a behavior to a diagnosis when the stem describes a typical stage.
Rule of thumb
Corrected age = chronological age minus weeks of prematurity (until ~24 months). If a stem gives a birth history, do the math before judging delay.
Worked example: A 10-month-old born at 28 weeks (12 weeks early) is not yet sitting. Corrected age ≈ 7 months; sitting is emerging at 6-8 months, so this is borderline, not clearly delayed-monitor and reassess rather than labeling.