CHILDRENS HEALTH

Following your child's development

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At each visit the doctor/nurse will check your child's growth and general development, and at certain stages there are other tests (hearing, sight), of which more here . Among other things, she will look at (and ask you about) fine and gross motor skills (babbling, sitting, rolling, building up brick towers, running, kicking a football, doing a jigsaw), social skills and language development. You get questionnaires to fill in beforehand for some appointments, to help steer the discussion. There are certain 'tests' that are used (does she follow an object with her eyes? can she make a bridge with bricks, aged four?) but in my experience they tend to be fairly sensible about the wide spectrum that is normal physical, social and intellectual development.

Growth is checked against your own child's curve and against national averages. Like many countries, the growth curves for young babies are (I understand) still for bottle-fed and not breast-fed infants, which can be an issue if you have a pernickety doctor and a growth-spurty baby. It's my experience, however, that this is rare: doctors here tend to look at your child as a whole, and are not too obsessed by the statistics, which is entirely as it should be. Some children are small, some large, so long as they're growing and following their own trend, that's fine. If you or the doctor is concerned about your child being too small/thin/tall, do look first at its heredity - and make sure the doctor does too; did you tell her about your 1m95 / 80kg husband? - and its growth progress before you start worrying, or allow yourself to be worried. More on the vexed topic of obesity on the Diet and Weight page.

If there appears to be an issue about any aspect of development, you are likely first to be called back to the clinic for a double-check / second opinion, and then directed to your huisarts followed by the appropriate specialist. The clinic will not themselves treat the problem, but will support you as you do so. 

What about the doctor who spouts (what you think is) outdated rubbish about multilingualism?

It is reasonably likely that at some point here you will be advised by a CB-arts or nurse that your choice of language environment, whatever it may be, is in some way impairing your child's linguistic development, and that you absolutely must do X [whatever their advice is] instead. I had it with my second, who was on the slow end of normal in both Dutch and English, and the doctor came up with advice I disagreed with. I smiled politely, nodded, avoided a discussion, ignored her (see the page on ignoring advice [P9]) and changed the subject next time she brought it up. I have yet to meet a CB-arts who is experienced in this field, and frankly I feel those without extensive experience of multilingual children shouldn't comment.

That was just with one doctor; on all other occasions I have simply been asked whether I was happy with my child's language, often complimented on their skills, and they left it at that. If there is any doubt about this area of your child's development, on your part or on the doctor's, I would suggest that you first do a reality check by talking to multi-national friends and acquaintances if you can, and then to seek specialist advice. See also the page on language and speech.

Preventative side