BOSTON -- A new test for babies is gaining national attention. It was originally developed for the National Institutes of Health to flag babies who may suffer developmental problems from being exposed to drugs in the womb.

As NewsCenter 5's Bianca de la Garza reported Tuesday, local researchers are using it to forecast the future development of children.

"They were born December 13, 2009. Thirty weeks and 4 days," said Cecilia Crowley, a mother to preemie baby boys.

Twin brothers, Patrick and Gavin Crowley, were born prematurely. Each week, their parents and their nurses have watched them grow stronger in their hospital room at Women and Infants Hospital in Providence, RI.

When we visited him last week, Patrick was strong enough to go home.

"Patrick's doing fantastic," said Crowley.

Before he was discharged, Dr. Barry Lester, the director of the Brown Center, stopped by to examine Patrick.

"This is a perfect time to screen Patrick," Lester said.

Lester used a new test he helped develop in the 1990s for under a contract with the National Institutes of Health to screen babies who may be at risk for cognitive and learning problems. A test like this could open up the possibility for children to get early intervention to prevent problems.

"You can identify in these babies certain patterns that we call profiles. Some of those profiles are indicative of problems later on," Lester said.

When Lester screened Patrick, he used a bell, a rattle and light to look for warning signs, such as signs of stress. Patrick was unaffected by the commotion. Lester said that was a good sign.

"His brain is able to make the decision that there's stuff going on. He's being affected by it, but he's not going to wake up and respond and disturb his sleep," he said.

Lester also assessed things like the baby's reflexes, his muscle strength and soothing skills.

"He's wrapping his toes around my finger. That's what we want him to do," Lester said. "One of the things we're always looking for is self consoling. He seems to be pretty good at it."

In the end, Patrick did well across the board.

"If he had showed a lot of stress signs every time I touched him, he would shake or turn his head, very dramatic changes in skin color, breathing might be later. Babies who have lot of those, that's a marker for poor outcome," Lester said.

According to a study in the journal Pediatric, more than 1,200 babies who underwent the screening and scored in poor range were more likely to have behavior problems by age 3 and a low IQ by age 4.5. Forty percent suffered problems such as anxiety and depression -- acting out -- and delays in motor and language skills.

Lester says the exam is being used in U.S. Centers and around the world for both research and intervention. He admits the test is not 100 percent accurate. Some infants put in the high-risk category may go on to have no problems, and vice versa.