As a parent, we are striving to provide and support our children so they can flourish. Although we are considering how we are influencing their day-to-day, we are also looking further into the future. How can we help and prepare them for adulthood? This is even more challenging if your child has a diagnosis of Cerebral Palsy. There are so many other elements to their care that you need to consider and make choices about. Treatments or Therapy is one of them and trying to navigate this area can be a minefield.

Iona Novak, Cathy Morgan, Michael Fahey, and their incredible team have produced a guide through their extensive systematic review. If you are not familiar with them, they are leading experts within the field of Cerebral palsy (across the world).  They have done the hard work for us, scouring the literature to determine what evidence supports specific interventions and developed a novel traffic light system to make it clearer. Treatments or interventions are clearly grouped into “Do it” (green), “Probably do it” (Yellow) with a clear cut-off with a “worth it line”. This line highlights that areas below this line are lacking in evidence, or if in red are likely to cause harm. The total opposite of what you are trying to achieve as a parent and clinician.

It is great to see that therapy options offered at Auckland Children’s Therapy (Motor and Early Intervention)  are in the “Do it” or  “Probably do it” which supports its effectiveness in helping children with CP. If you would like to know more about any of the interventions mentioned above, we are happy to discuss these and see if these are interventions you can add to your child’s therapy program.

Reference: Novak, I., Morgan, C., Fahey, M. et al. State of the Evidence Traffic Lights 2019: Systematic Review of Interventions for Preventing and Treating Children with Cerebral Palsy. Curr Neurol Neurosci Rep 20, 3 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11910-020-1022-z