[PS15-2C-K] Cerebral Palsy: Newer Mobility Devices and Robot-Assisted Rehabilitation
The management of children with cerebral palsy (CP) involves a cohesive mulitdisciplinary team, to address the complex requirements of each child and their family. Walking obviously is a very important aim for these children and their families. Thus, appropriate assistive mobility devices play an important role. In addition to the traditionally used walking aids such as posterior walkers and crutches, gait trainers have become more sophisticated and dynamic, enabling more children with CP to ambulate during educational and social settings.
In the last decade, there has been considerable interest in the use of body-weight supported robotic gait therapy with concomitant integrated interactive virtual reality. These initiatives are promising but showed varying outcomes. We shall present our series of older paediatric patients who have undergone Lokomat® gait training in the past 3 years, where there were encouraging improvements in the functional domains of 10-metres and 6-minutes walk test.
Positive outcomes from robot-assisted upper limb rehabilitation for adult stroke patients prompted the development of a similar but novel robotic device, to habilitate children with hemiplegic CP. We identified forearm pronation and supination, wrist flexion and extension, opposition of the index finger and thumb, as important movements required for function. Our preliminary results are encouraging with improvements in movement precision, range of motion, as well as fine motor assessments using some of the subtests of the Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency 2nd edition.
In this era of techno-wizardry, therapeutic intervention and exercise intensity can easily be monitored and stepped up sequentially using the data collected from these robotic devices to optimise training and habilitation.
In the last decade, there has been considerable interest in the use of body-weight supported robotic gait therapy with concomitant integrated interactive virtual reality. These initiatives are promising but showed varying outcomes. We shall present our series of older paediatric patients who have undergone Lokomat® gait training in the past 3 years, where there were encouraging improvements in the functional domains of 10-metres and 6-minutes walk test.
Positive outcomes from robot-assisted upper limb rehabilitation for adult stroke patients prompted the development of a similar but novel robotic device, to habilitate children with hemiplegic CP. We identified forearm pronation and supination, wrist flexion and extension, opposition of the index finger and thumb, as important movements required for function. Our preliminary results are encouraging with improvements in movement precision, range of motion, as well as fine motor assessments using some of the subtests of the Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency 2nd edition.
In this era of techno-wizardry, therapeutic intervention and exercise intensity can easily be monitored and stepped up sequentially using the data collected from these robotic devices to optimise training and habilitation.