Children who would not have survived ten years ago can have the opportunity to grow up and reach their full potential with the help of research at LiU.
Ulrika Ådén is a professor of pediatric medicine and specialist in neonatology (medical care of newborns).
"My research is about children who were born extremely prematurely or have had heart surgery as newborns. There’s an entire generation of children who have survived over the last decades, but we are only now beginning to understand that we also need to follow up on their development, to make sure all goes well for them,” she says.
At LiU, she leads a multidisciplinary research group where everyone is also active in health care. They have seen that there are critical time windows in premature babies when we need to stimulate brain development to prevent, for example, CP, autism, ADHD and intellectual disability.
“We see that early interventions work, but this has not really been adopted in Sweden. Today, it’s often discovered late which children would need help, and the measures are non-specific. This has major negative effects on health, development and quality of life. My vision for the future is that we identify early on who needs help, and be able to offer effective interventions,” says Ulrika Ådén.
