When Do Missed Milestones Call for a Developmental Delay Evaluation? A Calm Guide for Parents

The pediatrician’s waiting room has a low table with a wooden bead maze, and the toddler next to yours has been chattering at it for ten minutes: “Blue! Go! Mama, look!” Your own child, three weeks older, is quietly pushing one bead back and forth. You find yourself counting. Twelve words? Eight? You are not sure any of them count.

Most parents arrive at the question of when to seek help for developmental delay in exactly this way: sideways, through a comparison they did not mean to make, followed by a night of searching that leaves them more frightened and less clear. The internet is full of confident lists. Real children are not lists.

This guide is written for that night. It explains what a delay actually is, how the evaluation unfolds, which observations deserve a phone call this week, and which can wait for the next scheduled visit. The short version is that asking early costs very little and waiting can cost a great deal.

How child development actually unfolds, and why it runs on ranges rather than dates

Development is not a staircase where every child steps onto the same tread on the same day. It is closer to a wide river with a current: nearly everyone moves in the same direction, but some children hug the fast channel while others drift along the bank and arrive later, entirely well.

That is why the CDC’s milestone lists were rewritten in their most recent update so that each milestone is one that 75% or more of children can do by that age. Earlier versions used the 50% mark, which meant that half of all typically developing children technically “missed” a milestone on any given day. The new threshold is deliberately designed so that a missed milestone is a genuine signal worth discussing, not statistical noise.

Clinicians divide development into a handful of domains so they can see the shape of a child’s progress rather than a single score:

• Gross motor: rolling, sitting, walking, climbing.
• Fine motor: grasping, stacking, scribbling, using a spoon.
• Language: understanding words (receptive) and producing them (expressive).
• Cognitive: problem-solving, pretend play, following simple directions.
• Social and emotional: eye contact, sharing attention, comfort with caregivers.

A child who walks late but points, babbles and plays peekaboo enthusiastically tells a very different story from a child who walks on time but rarely looks up when their name is called. The pattern across domains, and the direction of travel over months, matters far more than any single date on a chart.

Two other facts shape everything that follows. First, the brain builds its densest network of connections in the first three years, which is why early support has an outsized effect. Second, skills already gained should not disappear. A child who stops doing something they used to do is showing a pattern that clinicians take seriously at any age.

What counts as a developmental delay, and what global developmental delay means

A developmental delay is a term clinicians use when a child is significantly behind peers in one or more domains, typically measured against standardized age norms rather than against the neighbor’s child. “Significantly” is the operative word. Being a few weeks behind on a single skill is not a delay in the clinical sense.

When a young child is significantly behind in two or more domains, clinicians may use the term global developmental delay. According to the Cleveland Clinic, this label is generally applied to children under about five years old, because before that age formal intelligence testing is unreliable and it is too early to know whether the child will catch up, plateau, or later meet criteria for a specific diagnosis such as intellectual disability or autism spectrum disorder.

It helps to understand that “developmental delay” is a description, not a destiny. It says where a child is now relative to norms. It does not by itself say why, or where they will be at seven. Some children with an isolated speech delay are indistinguishable from peers by kindergarten. Others turn out to have a hearing loss that, once addressed, unlocks rapid progress. A smaller group have an underlying condition that will need long-term support. The evaluation exists to sort these possibilities, and that sorting takes time.

The CDC estimates that roughly 1 in 6 children in the United States between the ages of 3 and 17 has one or more developmental disabilities, a broad category that includes speech and language conditions, learning differences, ADHD, autism and intellectual disability. Delay is common. It is also, in most cases, something families and clinicians can do a great deal about.

What causes developmental delay? Often no single cause is found. Known contributors include prematurity, genetic conditions, hearing or vision impairment, complications around birth, certain infections in pregnancy, lead exposure and severe early deprivation. A thorough evaluation looks for the treatable ones first.

When to seek help for developmental delay: the honest short answer

The clearest guidance from the CDC, the NHS and MedlinePlus converges on one point: act on a concern when you have it. Do not wait for the next birthday, the next scheduled check, or for a relative to agree with you.

Here is why the “wait and see” instinct, while understandable, is usually the wrong bet. If your child is developing typically, an early evaluation confirms that and buys you peace of mind. If your child is not, the months you spend waiting are months of support they did not receive during the period when their brain is most responsive to it. The downside of asking early is an appointment. The downside of waiting is not symmetrical.

Three situations should prompt a call to your pediatrician or family doctor rather than a note in your phone:

• Your child has clearly missed a milestone that most children reach by their age, using an evidence-based chart such as the CDC’s rather than an online quiz.
• Your child has lost a skill they once had, such as words, gestures or social engagement.
• You, or someone who spends a great deal of time with your child such as a daycare teacher, have a persistent feeling that something is not right, even if you cannot name it.

That third point deserves emphasis. Parental concern is itself a validated screening signal; standardized developmental questionnaires are built around it precisely because parents notice things in ordinary daily life that a clinician cannot see in a fifteen-minute visit.

You do not need to be certain. You do not need to have a theory. “I’d like my child screened for development” is a complete sentence, and any pediatric practice will know exactly what to do with it. In the United States, the CDC also notes that families can contact their state’s early intervention program directly for a free evaluation for children under three, with no doctor’s referral required.

When to worry about developmental delays: signs of developmental delay in toddlers that deserve a call this week

This is not a checklist for diagnosing your child at the kitchen table. It is a summary of the observations that mainstream pediatric guidance, including the CDC’s “Concerned About Your Child’s Development?” resources and the NHS’s guidance on early signs of autism, treats as reasons to act rather than wait. Diagnosis stays with the clinical team.

In the first year, clinicians want to hear about a baby who does not respond to loud sounds or turn toward a voice, who does not smile back at people by several months of age, who does not babble or reach for objects, or who has body tone that feels unusually stiff or unusually floppy compared with other babies you have held.

Around the first birthday, the concerning pattern is a child who does not point, wave, or show you things; who does not respond to their own name; who does not use gestures to get what they want; or who has not started using any consonant sounds.

Between one and two, it is a child with very few or no words who also is not using gestures to communicate, who does not follow simple one-step directions, who does not engage in back-and-forth play, or who shows little interest in other children or in imitating adults.

At any age, the two observations that most reliably prompt urgent referral are regression, meaning skills that were present and have faded, and asymmetry, meaning a child who consistently uses one side of the body far more than the other, or who has a persistent head tilt or eye turn.

Notice what is not on this list: a late walker who is otherwise engaged and communicative, a child who says fewer words than a cousin but gestures constantly and understands everything, a toddler who is shy with strangers but warm at home. Those children may still benefit from a conversation with their doctor. They are not the pattern that keeps developmental pediatricians up at night.

How a developmental delay evaluation actually works, step by step

Parents often picture an evaluation as a single high-stakes test with a pass or fail result. In practice it is a funnel with three widening stages, and most children never reach the bottom of it.

Stage one is developmental surveillance, which happens at every routine well-child visit. Your doctor asks what your child is doing, watches them in the room, and notes anything that stands out. It is informal by design.

Stage two is developmental screening, which uses a standardized, validated questionnaire. In the United States, pediatric guidance calls for formal developmental screening at the 9, 18 and 30-month visits, with additional autism-specific screening at 18 and 24 months, according to the CDC’s screening resources. You usually complete these yourself in the waiting room or online beforehand. In England, the NHS builds equivalent reviews into the health visitor program, with a development check at around 9 to 12 months and another between 2 and 2½ years. A screening result is a flag, not a diagnosis. It sorts children into “reassuring” and “deserves a closer look.”

Stage three is the comprehensive developmental evaluation. This is the part people mean when they say “evaluation.” It is carried out by a developmental pediatrician, child psychologist, neurologist, or a multidisciplinary early intervention team, depending on where you live and what the concern is. A typical evaluation includes:

• A detailed history: pregnancy, birth, medical events, family patterns, and exactly when you first noticed each concern.
• Direct observation of your child at play, often over one or more sessions.
• Standardized assessments of each domain, scored against age norms.
• A hearing test for any child with language concerns, because undetected hearing loss is one of the most common and most correctable causes of speech delay.
• Sometimes a vision check, bloodwork for lead or thyroid function, or genetic testing when the pattern suggests it.

The evaluation ends with a written report describing your child’s current skills in each domain, whether they meet criteria for a delay or a specific diagnosis, and what services are recommended. Nothing in that report is a verdict. It is a map of where to start.

Who is usually referred straight away, and who is usually asked to re-check in a few months

Clinicians make a triage decision every time a parent raises a developmental concern, and it helps to understand the logic so that neither an immediate referral nor a “let’s recheck” feels arbitrary.

Referral is usually immediate when there is regression of any skill at any age; when a screening questionnaire scores in the concerning range; when a child shows the combined pattern of limited language plus limited gestures plus reduced social response, which together raise the question of autism; when there is motor asymmetry, abnormal muscle tone or a persistent head tilt; when there are known risk factors such as significant prematurity, a genetic diagnosis, or a medical event affecting the brain; or when a child of any age has no words and is not compensating with gestures. In these cases, guidance from the CDC is explicit: refer for evaluation and begin early intervention at the same time, rather than waiting for the full evaluation to finish.

A watchful recheck, typically in about one to three months rather than a full year, is more often suggested when a child is mildly behind in a single domain but clearly progressing; when the screening score sits in a borderline “monitor” zone rather than a concerning one; when there is an obvious and temporary explanation such as a recent illness, a new sibling, a house move or a period of frequent ear infections; or when the child is bilingual and the total vocabulary across both languages is actually age-appropriate.

Two caveats matter. First, “wait and recheck” should come with a specific date and a specific thing to watch for, not an open-ended “boys are just slower.” If you leave without a plan, ask for one. Second, a hearing test is reasonable for almost any child with a language concern, even one who is otherwise being monitored, because it is quick, painless and rules out the single most fixable cause.

If you disagree with a wait-and-see recommendation, you are entitled to say so and to ask for a referral anyway. Parental concern is a legitimate clinical indication, not a nuisance.

Monitoring, screening or full evaluation: a side-by-side summary

Families often hear these three words used loosely, sometimes interchangeably, and leave a visit unsure of what was actually done. The table below sets out how mainstream pediatric guidance distinguishes them.

Step	What it is	Who does it	When it happens	What the result means
Developmental monitoring (surveillance)	Informal observation and conversation about what your child is doing	Parents, caregivers, pediatrician, daycare staff	Continuously; at every well-child visit	Raises or lowers the level of concern; never a diagnosis
Developmental screening	A brief, validated questionnaire scored against age norms	Pediatric practice, health visitor, or early intervention intake	Routinely at about 9, 18 and 30 months in the US, plus autism screening at 18 and 24 months; and any time a concern arises	“Reassuring” or “refer for closer look”; a flag, not a diagnosis
Comprehensive developmental evaluation	In-depth, multi-domain assessment with history, observation, standardized testing and often hearing and vision checks	Developmental pediatrician, psychologist, neurologist, or multidisciplinary early intervention team	After a positive screen, a lost skill, or a persistent parental concern	Describes current skills, may or may not assign a diagnosis, and recommends specific services

A few practical points fall out of this table. You can request screening at any visit, not only at the scheduled ages; the CDC explicitly encourages this. A “passed” screen at 18 months does not close the question if new concerns appear at 22 months. And a referral for full evaluation is not the same as a diagnosis; many children referred for evaluation are found to have an isolated, mild delay, or no delay at all.

In the United States, the comprehensive evaluation for children under three is typically provided at no charge to families through each state’s early intervention program under federal law, and for children three and older through the local public school district. Ask your doctor’s office for the contact details for your area.

Developmental delay vs autism: can a child have developmental delay and not be autistic?

Yes, and in fact most children with a developmental delay do not have autism. This is the single most common fear parents bring into the first appointment, so it is worth being precise about how the two overlap and how they differ.

Autism spectrum disorder is a neurodevelopmental condition defined by two features present together: differences in social communication and interaction, and restricted, repetitive patterns of behavior or interests. The Mayo Clinic notes that signs often appear within the first two years and that presentation varies enormously from child to child. The CDC’s most recent surveillance estimates that roughly 1 in 31 to 1 in 36 eight-year-olds in the United States have been identified with autism, depending on the survey year.

A developmental delay, by contrast, is a description of pace, not of a specific pattern. A child can be delayed in speech alone, or in motor skills alone, or globally, without any of the social-communication differences that define autism.

What clinicians look at to tell the two apart is not word count but what the child does with the words they have and the attention they have:

• A child with an isolated speech delay typically points, waves, brings you toys, looks where you look, and uses their few words to share and request. Their communication is delayed but socially aimed.
• A child whose profile raises the question of autism more often has reduced pointing and showing, inconsistent response to their name, less back-and-forth play, and may show intense focus on particular objects or movements, along with the language delay.

The NHS guidance on signs of autism in young children makes the same distinction: the concern is less about late talking in isolation and more about how a child engages with people around them.

Two further points. Hearing loss can mimic parts of this picture, which is why a hearing test comes first. And some children who initially look autistic at eighteen months do not meet criteria at three, while others move the other way. The evaluation team’s job is to keep watching the pattern over time, not to stamp a label at the first visit.

What the days and weeks after a referral usually look like

The stretch between “we should have this looked at” and “here is the plan” is where families feel most adrift, so it helps to know the typical shape of it. Timelines vary by region and by how busy local services are; these are typical ranges described in public health guidance, not promises.

The first one to two weeks are usually spent on intake. In the US early intervention system, you or your doctor make contact, a service coordinator calls back, and you complete forms about your child’s history and your concerns. Under federal rules, the program is expected to complete the evaluation and, if your child is eligible, hold the planning meeting within 45 days of that first referral, according to CDC guidance for families.

The evaluation itself is often one to three sessions, sometimes at home, sometimes at a center. Home visits are common for infants and toddlers because children behave more naturally on their own floor. Expect the team to bring a bag of toys and to spend a lot of time simply watching your child play while asking you questions. It rarely feels like a test to the child.

Hearing and vision checks may run in parallel through your pediatrician, and these can add a week or two.

The feedback meeting is where you receive the written report and, if your child qualifies, an individualized plan naming the services, their frequency, and the goals for the next several months. You are a full member of this planning team and can push back on any goal that does not reflect your child or your family’s priorities.

Specialist appointments such as a developmental pediatrician or geneticist typically run on longer waits than early intervention. Guidance from the CDC is clear that therapy should not be delayed while waiting for a specialist; the two tracks run at the same time.

Emotionally, most parents describe the first weeks as the hardest, before anything has started. Once sessions begin and you see the therapist working with your child, the abstract fear tends to shrink into concrete, manageable tasks.

What early intervention for developmental delay actually involves

Early intervention is the umbrella term for therapy and support services delivered to young children with delays or disabilities and to their families, ideally before age three. Its logic rests on a simple observation about brain development: connections form fastest and most flexibly in the first few years, so the same hour of practice tends to go further at eighteen months than at six years.

What it looks like depends on the domain of concern:

• Speech-language therapy for children with communication delays, working on understanding, gestures, first words and, where appropriate, picture-based or sign-supported communication alongside spoken language.
• Occupational therapy for fine motor skills, feeding, sensory processing and daily routines such as dressing.
• Physical therapy for gross motor delays, muscle tone differences and mobility.
• Developmental or behavioral therapy for children whose profile includes social-communication differences, with a focus on joint attention, play and engagement.
• Family coaching, which is present in nearly every program, because a therapist sees a child for an hour a week and a parent sees them for the other 167.

That last point is the part parents most often underestimate. Modern early intervention is built around coaching caregivers to weave small, targeted strategies into bath time, mealtimes and play, rather than around the child performing for a professional in a clinic. A good therapist will spend as much time showing you what to do as doing it themselves.

Where medication enters the picture at all, it is usually for a co-occurring medical issue uncovered by the evaluation, such as a seizure disorder or a thyroid condition, and those decisions sit entirely with the prescribing clinician. There is no medicine that treats developmental delay itself.

Be cautious about therapies marketed outside this mainstream framework. If a program promises rapid results, discourages you from telling your pediatrician, or leans on testimonials rather than evidence, raise it with your care team before spending time or money on it.

At what age does developmental delay end, and can a child catch up?

These two questions are really one question asked from different directions, and the honest answer is that it depends on what is causing the delay, which is precisely what the evaluation tries to find out.

Some children do catch up completely. This is most common with isolated delays in a single domain, especially expressive language, and with delays that have a correctable cause such as fluid behind the eardrums or an untreated hearing loss. For these children, “developmental delay” turns out to have been a description of a slow start, and by school age nothing distinguishes them from peers.

Other children close part of the gap but not all of it. They make real, measurable progress with support while continuing to need some accommodation, and the label may shift over time from “delay” to a more specific description such as developmental language disorder or a learning difference.

A third group are eventually found to have an underlying condition, such as intellectual disability, cerebral palsy or autism, in which case the goal is not catching up on a fixed timeline but building skills, independence and quality of life over years. Progress is still the expectation. The destination is simply different.

As for age: the term “global developmental delay” is generally retired around age five, according to the Cleveland Clinic, because by then formal testing becomes reliable enough to describe a child’s profile more specifically. That is a change in vocabulary, not a deadline for the child. Development continues throughout childhood and adolescence, and children keep gaining skills long after the early intervention window closes. The brain remains capable of change; it simply changes more slowly and needs more repetition.

No clinician can tell you at eighteen months which of these paths your child is on. Anyone who claims to be able to should be met with polite skepticism. What the evidence does support, consistently, is that earlier support improves the trajectory in all three groups.

What people often get wrong about missed milestones

Some of the most persistent myths about developmental delay come from kind places: a grandmother’s reassurance, a friend’s story, a well-meaning search result. They still cost children time.

“Boys talk later; he’ll catch up.” Boys on average do produce first words slightly later than girls, but the difference is a matter of weeks, not a year. A boy who is significantly behind on evidence-based norms is behind, full stop. Sex is not an explanation for a missed milestone.

“He’s bilingual, so of course he’s delayed.” Children raised with two languages may distribute their vocabulary across both and can mix them for a time, but their total word count and their understanding, gestures and social engagement should be on track. Bilingualism does not cause developmental delay.

“Einstein didn’t talk until he was four.” Anecdotes about famous late talkers are unverifiable and, even if true, tell you nothing about your child. Population-level evidence does not support waiting.

“If it were serious, the doctor would have said something.” A routine visit is short. Your doctor sees a snapshot; you see the whole film. Screening questionnaires exist because parents’ daily observations are more informative than a brief examination.

“A referral means they think something is wrong with my child.” A referral means a clinician wants more information. Many children evaluated are found to have mild or no delays. The evaluation is diagnostic, not accusatory.

“Screens caused this” or “I caused this.” Heavy screen time can displace the back-and-forth interaction that language depends on, and reducing it is sensible, but most developmental delays have no identifiable cause and are not the result of parenting. Guilt is common; it is not evidence.

“Once they get a label, it sticks forever.” Early diagnoses are revisited as children grow. Labels open doors to services; they can and do change.

The thread running through all of these is the same: reassurance that delays action is not reassurance. It is a bet, and the child is the stake.

Questions to ask your care team at the first appointment

A first developmental appointment is stressful, and questions evaporate the moment the door closes. Bring these written down, and add your own. There are no foolish ones.

• Which specific milestones is my child behind on, and by roughly how much? This moves the conversation from “a bit slow” to something measurable.
• Is this a delay in one area or several? The answer changes the likely next steps.
• Has my child’s hearing been formally tested? If not, ask why not.
• What is the plan if we wait and recheck: how long, and what exactly are we watching for? Leave with a date.
• Can we start early intervention now, while we wait for the specialist? Guidance supports running both tracks at once.
• How do I contact my local early intervention program directly? Ask for the phone number, not just the name.
• What can I do at home this month that is likely to help? Concrete strategies, not a pamphlet.
• Are there medical tests you are considering, and what would each one tell us? Understanding the purpose of bloodwork or genetic testing makes the wait easier.
• What would make you more concerned between now and the next visit? This gives you a personalized version of the red-flag list.
• How will we know if the therapy is working, and when will we reassess? Good programs measure progress against written goals.
• If I disagree with a decision, what are my options? A second opinion is a normal part of pediatric care.

One practical tip: bring a short video. Thirty seconds of your child playing, talking or moving at home often tells a clinician more than a description, and children rarely perform their best in an unfamiliar room. Note the date each concern first appeared, as best you can remember. And bring another adult if possible, because two sets of ears remember more than one.

When to call your doctor: red-flag signs that should not wait for the next check-up

Most developmental concerns can be raised at a scheduled visit or through a routine appointment. A few should prompt a call the same day or within the week, because they may point to a medical issue that needs prompt attention or because delay in acting has a real cost.

Call your doctor promptly if your child:

• Loses any skill they previously had: words, gestures, eye contact, social smiling, or motor abilities.
• Stops responding to sounds or to their name when they used to, or does not startle to loud noises.
• Consistently uses one side of the body far more than the other, holds one hand fisted past the early months, or has a persistent head tilt or eye turn.
• Feels markedly stiff or markedly floppy compared with other children of the same age.
• Has episodes of staring, jerking, stiffening or brief unresponsiveness that could be seizures.
• Has an unusually rapid or unusually slow increase in head size noted at visits.
• Shows a sudden change in behavior, alertness or feeding along with any developmental concern.

Seek emergency care for a seizure lasting more than a few minutes, difficulty breathing, a child who cannot be roused, or any sudden loss of skills following a fall, head injury or high fever.

Raise at your next routine visit, or book an earlier one if the next is more than a month away: a missed milestone on an evidence-based chart, a screening questionnaire you completed at home that scored in the concerning range, a persistent feeling that your child is not engaging the way other children do, or concerns raised by a childcare provider.

Every decision about testing, referral, diagnosis and therapy rests with your child’s treating team, who can see the whole picture. Your job is not to diagnose. It is to notice, describe clearly and ask. Parents who do those three things well are the single most important part of any developmental evaluation.

Frequently asked questions

When should I worry about developmental delays in my toddler?

Raise a concern with your doctor as soon as you notice a clearly missed milestone, a lost skill, or a persistent sense that your child engages differently from peers. Waiting to see whether a child catches up delays support during the years when the brain responds to it most. Evidence-based charts such as the CDC’s are better guides than comparison with other children, and parental concern alone is a valid reason to request screening.

At what age does developmental delay end?

There is no fixed age. The specific term “global developmental delay” is usually retired around age five, when formal testing becomes reliable enough to describe a child’s profile more precisely, but that is a change in vocabulary rather than a deadline. Some children catch up fully by school age, some close part of the gap, and some receive a more specific diagnosis and continue gaining skills with support throughout childhood.

Can a child recover from developmental delay?

Many children do catch up completely, especially those with an isolated delay in one area such as expressive speech, or a correctable cause such as hearing loss. Others make real progress while continuing to need some support. Which path a child is on cannot be predicted at the first appointment; it becomes clear over months of observation and therapy. Earlier support improves the trajectory across all of these groups.

Can a child have developmental delay and not be autistic?

Yes. Most children with a developmental delay do not have autism. Autism involves differences in social communication together with repetitive behaviors or restricted interests, whereas a delay describes pace alone. A late talker who points, shows you things, responds to their name and plays back-and-forth games has a very different profile from one who does not, and clinicians weigh those social features far more than word count.

What is the difference between developmental delay vs autism on a screening test?

General developmental screeners measure progress across motor, language, cognitive and social domains against age norms. Autism-specific screeners ask about social behaviors such as pointing to share interest, responding to a name, pretend play and eye contact. A child can score in the concerning range on the first and not the second. Either result is a flag for further evaluation, not a diagnosis.

What causes developmental delay in young children?

Often no single cause is identified. Known contributors include prematurity, genetic conditions, hearing or vision impairment, complications around birth, certain infections during pregnancy, lead exposure and severe early deprivation. Part of a comprehensive evaluation is to look for treatable causes first, which is why hearing tests and sometimes bloodwork are included. Developmental delay is not generally the result of ordinary parenting decisions.

What does early intervention for developmental delay involve?

Early intervention combines therapies such as speech-language, occupational, physical or developmental therapy with coaching for parents, so that strategies are woven into everyday routines. It is designed for children under three and is delivered at home or in a center. In the United States it is available through each state’s program, and a family can request an evaluation directly without a doctor’s referral.

Do I need a doctor's referral to get my child evaluated?

In the United States, no. The CDC notes that families can contact their state’s early intervention program directly for children under three, and the local public school district for children three and older, to request a free developmental evaluation. Telling your pediatrician at the same time is still wise, because they can arrange hearing tests and other medical checks and coordinate the overall plan.

What are the signs of developmental delay in toddlers that need urgent attention?

The observations clinicians treat most urgently are loss of any previously held skill, a child who stops responding to sounds or their name, consistent use of one side of the body over the other, marked stiffness or floppiness, and episodes that could be seizures. These deserve a call to your doctor within days rather than at the next scheduled visit. Diagnosis remains with the clinical team.

Is it normal for a bilingual child to talk late?

Bilingual children may spread their vocabulary across two languages and mix them for a time, but their total word count, understanding, gestures and social engagement should be on track for their age. Bilingualism does not cause developmental delay. If you count words in both languages and the total is still low, or if gestures and social response are limited, ask for a screening.

References

• CDC: Developmental Milestones (Learn the Signs. Act Early.)
• Cleveland Clinic: Developmental Delay in Children
• NHS: Your baby's health and development reviews
• MedlinePlus: Developmental Disabilities

This article is for general information only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. Please consult a qualified doctor about your individual situation.