Jean-Adolphe Rondal - Böcker

People with Down Syndrome show a specific developmental profile with strengths in social understanding and visual learning and memory, and more difficulties with motor processes, speech and language, and auditory-vocal short-term memory. It is important that parents, practitioners and teachers know this and adapt interventions and educational approaches to take account of this particular profile. This is the only book to date that explains the developmental profile of people with Down Syndrome from its many different angles. It covers a range of perspectives, including the biology, psychology, speech and language, health care, and social competence of both children and adults with Down Syndrome. All the information is gathered and placed in the context of the neuro-genetic science that is developing around this area.

Therapies and Rehabilitation in Down Syndrome covers the entire lifespan of a DS patient, from infancy to 60 years and beyond, focusing not simply on identifying problems, but providing a detailed look at major therapeutic approaches. Discussion includes future genetic therapy, questions of quality of life, hormone and other therapies for medical problems, prevention and treatment of normal and pathological aging, as well as psychomotoric rehabilitation. This is an important book not only for scientists concerned with various facets of DS, but practitioners looking for guidelines for therapies and clinical application of research findings.

Down syndrome is one of the most commonly occurring developmental disorders and it is now possible to conceptualize and define opportunities for neurocognitive rehabilitation for those with the condition. This book describes how early cognitive intervention in children with Down syndrome can be carried out, and can reduce, or compensate for, the major deficits characteristic of the condition. This comprehensive account relates the neurocognitive approach to the major therapeutic endeavors in the neighboring fields of neurogenetics, experimental environmental enrichment, molecular genetics, pharmacology, pediatrics and cardiology for infants with Down syndrome. Neurocognitive Rehabilitation of Down Syndrome provides the guidance required to establish effective rehabilitation programs, and is essential reading for developmental clinicians, pediatricians, neuropsychologists and other health professionals.

This book is intended both as a comprehensive review and discussion of the major studies of language development and functioning in mentally retarded (MR) persons over the last fifty years, and as an exploration of a number of important issues in this field. *The use of the term 'mental retardation' is in line with the recommendations of the American Association on Mental Retardation and other relevant organisations.

This text contains a collection of papers presented at the 6th World Congress on Down's Syndrome, held in Madrid in October 1997. The papers focus on the scientific advances and therapeutic practices that make it possible for people with Down's syndrome to enjoy good health, to be recognized socially, to go to mainstream school, to have a job, to integrate in their community and to enjoy a better quality of life. The papers aim to reflect the dynamism of the Down's syndrome community at national and international levels, and the questions and solutions envisaged in many parts of the world. They also highlight the challenges for future concern. The most important and urgent challenges discussed are: increased recognition of the syndromic specificity of Down's syndrome; better knowledge of the genetic mechanisms inducing Down's syndrome and of the individual variation at the genetic and epigenetic level (particularly brain development); more precise characterization of psychological, educational and social development in Down's syndrome individuals; continued improvement of medical care for the whole life cycle of Down's syndrome individuals; better and specialized school techniques and approaches for tracking literacy and computational skills in Down's syndrome children and adolescents; more effective ways of integrating Down syndrome individuals into society and making them feel and be fully-fledged members of our social structures; and adequate medical, psychological, and social care of ageing Down's syndrome persons