what are the differences between developmental delay and mental impairment.?

Answer 1

"Mental impairment" includes every diagnosis pertaining to the brain. It refers to physical problems in the brain due to injury, stroke, degenerative neurological diseases (such as Alzheimer's and other dementias). It also includes mental illnesses.
"developmental delay" is present when a child fails to develop cognitively at a normal rate compared to other kids his/her age. Other aspects of developmental delay are speech and language delay and motor delay.
All types of delay must be present. Be aware that these disorders can be found in kids WITHOUT developmental delay.

Answer 2

"Developmental delay" is one of the latest in the series of PC terms for retarded. It's a misleading term as people who have mental retardation are not delayed and are unable to learn passed a certain level.

Mental impairment on the other hand, can be used to describe someone who is intoxicated, ill or otherwise not working at their best. I suppose one could use this term to describe permanent brain damage, but I've never seen or heard it used this way.

Answer 3

One got to be sensitive when answer this question. It probably refers to the growth of a baby or a child. Developmental delay means inability to perform certain functions at appropriate age. For example, a toddler is expected to crawl or walk at certain age but still cannot do so or doing it poorly. However, the kid is expected to perform the task well few weeks later. Obviously, further follow-up and review is required to confirm the diagnosis.

Mental impairment implies that there is permanent injury to the nervous system or musculoskeletal system and therefore the child cannot perform a task at all or normally. One would not expect tremendous improvement in this condition. However, one can still provide physiotherapy, training or physical aids to help the kid to lead a better quality of life. Something can be done. Similarly, the kid would need further follow-up and assessment. Example of the later includes cerebral palsy or some congenital infection.

Answer 4

Simck makes sense..................

A person on this site for 1 1/2 yrs and has never bothered to answer a question is lucky to get so many responses from anyone. Perhaps this is called developmental delay, not reaching appropriate milestones at generally accepted times. That doesn't mean one is mentally impaired, just more interested in taking than in giving back.

You should have that looked at.

Answer 5

I would say a rather simple answer would be that developmental delay is not something permanent and mental impairment usually is.

Answer 6

Development delay means it is slowly developing and may catch up and mental impairment is when it stops developing and stays at a certain range

Answer 7

delay means they learn slower but can learn
impairment means they are limited in what they can learn