Periventricular leukomalacia: a common CT finding in full-term children with congenital hemiplegia

CT studies of 83 children born at term with congenital hemiplegic cerebral palsy (CP) were reviewed. The children belonged to a Swedish population-based series of a total of 115 children with congenital hemiplegic CP born at term, aged 5–15 years. The CT images were analysed for morphological evidence of periventricular leukomalacia (PVL) and the medical records scrutinised for risk factors and causes of hemiplegia. Although PVL is considered to be typical of the preterm infant it was the most prevalent CT finding in these term born hemiplegic children, being seen in 33 cases (40%). The presence of PVL suggests that the injury, caused by an hypoxic-is-chaemic event, occurs in utero. This was supported by clinical data in 25 children.