Very preterm birth has shown to increase risk for adverse neurodevelopment. Despite the decreased rate of cerebral palsy (CP), neurodevelopmental impairments other than CP are still common in children born preterm. This thesis is part of the multidisciplinary PIPARI follow-up study (The Development and Functioning of Very Low Birth Weight Infants from Infancy to School Age) of infants born very preterm. It includes three original studies that present data regarding long-term neurodevelopmental outcomes and functional brain magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) findings of the children born very preterm (birth weight ≤1500 grams and/or gestational age <32 weeks) born in 2001-2006.

The first aim of this thesis was to study the motor outcome at 11 years and its association with concurrent cognitive outcome and health-related quality of life. The second aim was to study the association between neurological examination at 2 years of corrected age and neurodevelopment at 11 years. The third aim was to study the hand coordination skills of 13-year-old adolescents born very preterm and full-term controls, and to assess brain activation in fMRI during these hand coordination tasks.

This thesis showed that motor impairment other than CP was still common in children born very preterm and that motor impairment was associated with adverse cognitive outcome and lower self-experienced health-related quality of life at 11 years of age. The neurological examination at 2 years was associated with cognitive outcome at 11 years of age. The fMRI findings at 13 years showed that, although the clinical performance of hand coordination tasks was similar in adolescents born very preterm and controls, the task-related brain activation was stronger in adolescents born very preterm compared to the controls born full-term.