Paediatricsmiddle twist
A 3-year-old boy is assessed because he is behind his twin sister. He walked at 22 months and now runs stiffly but symmetrically; tone, power and deep tendon reflexes are normal and there was no birth difficulty. He has about thirty single words and no phrases. He makes eye contact, laughs at shared jokes, brings toys over to show his parents and plays chase with his sister, and he has no rigid routines or repetitive mannerisms. Standardised testing places him more than two standard deviations below the mean for both motor and language skills. Which one of the following terms best describes his developmental profile?