Cerebral Palsy

by Orla
(Dundalk, Ireland)

Hi, My son is 2 years old and has right-side hemiplegic cerebral palsy. He is not walking yet and does not use his right arm. I am interested in knowing if you would be able to help him in any way.

Orla, thank you for your enquiry about First Step Therapy for Cerebral Palsy (CP).

As you may already know, Cerberal Palsy is an umbrella term which describes a group of conditions that cause physical disability in humans, mainly in and around the body's ability to undertake purposeful movements.

It occurs as the result of injury to the motor control centres of the child's brain and can happen during pregnancy, during child-birth or after birth up to about three years of age.

CP may be as the result of trauma in the womb (e.g. due to maternal or fetal infection, brain malformation due to genetic mutations, bleeding inside the brain, or reduced oxygen flow to the foetus), trauma during delivery (e.g. breach birth, cord wrapping or other delivery complications), or as the result of a childhood infection (e.g. bacterial meningitis or viral encephalitis, etc), or head injury.

The motor disorders of cerebral palsy are often accompanied by abnormalities of the sensory system, cognitive impairment, poor communication, and other musculoskeletal problems such as muscle weakness and reduced strength capacity.

First Step Therapy is well suited to most neurological disorders and cerebral palsy is one for which our therapy works very well. We have many children who attend and some of these are younger than 2 yrs old.

With neurological disorders, it is better to start rehabilitation as soon as possible to maximise the potential for recovery. As children's brains are still developing we can take advantage of a concept called neuroplasticity in which the brain makes new neuronal pathways in response to new activities and sensory inputs.

The infant brain is still growing and we can harness this growth activity to help the body potentially recover lost abilities or acquire new ones.

The best thing you for to do is to bring your child for a free assessment and we will give you an honest opinion of what we think can be achieved for your child.

Please give us a call on 048 3083 2865 to arrange this and we look forward to seeing you soon.

Regards, The First Step Therapy Team