Prematurity and "Cerebral Palsy"

That there is an association between prematurity and "cerebral palsy " impressed the earliest students of this neurological condition (Little, 1862; Freud, 1897). Its nature has puzzled many; for some, like Brissaud (1894), the effect of prematurity is to cause a develop- mental anomaly of the pyramidal tracts; for others, like Collier (1924), the two conditions are parallel mani- festations of an intrauterine abnormality causing both prematurity and primary antenatal degeneration of cerebral neurones.