FAQPebbles Rehabilitation Centre :: Chennai

Frequently Asked QuestionsPebbles Rehabilitation Centre :: Chennai

An Introduction

The primary occupation of children is play. Through play, children learn the foundation of skills necessary for success in school, among peers, and in activities of daily living. Occupational therapists assess, utilize, and adapt everyday activities to improve function, enhance performance, promote health, and increase independence in Children. Occupational Therapist identifies areas of need and develops creative solutions to address these areas while respecting kid’s background and culture and valuing their quality of life.

  Who will benefit from Occupation Therapy?

Children with the following medical problems may benefit from Occupation Therapy:

Cerebral Palsy
Sensory Processing/Integrative Disorders
Dyslexia
Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorders
Autism And Related Disorders
Developmental Co-Ordination Disorder
Down syndrome
Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis
Orthopedic Problems
Developmental Delay
Birth Injuries Or Birth Defects
Burns
Spina Bifida
Hydrocephalus
Other Neurological Deficits etc.,

  Are Physical Therapy and Occupational Therapy the Same?

Although both types of therapy help kids improve the quality of their lives, there are differences. Physical therapy deals with the issues of pain, strength, joint range of motion, endurance, and gross motor functioning, whereas Occupational Therapy deals more with fine motor skills, visual-perceptual skills, cognitive skills, and sensory-processing deficits.

  Areas of Occupational Therapy

Occupational therapy treatment is necessary when several areas of performance are affected.

Fine Motor Skills: Movement and dexterity of the small muscles in the hands and fingers.
Gross Motor Skills: movement of the large muscles in the arms, and legs.
Visual Motor Skills: a child’s movement based on the perception of visual information.
Oral Motor Skills: movement of muscles in the mouth, lips, tongue, and jaw, including sucking, biting, chewing, and licking.
Self-Care Skills: daily dressing, feeding and toilet tasks. Sensory Integration: ability to take in, sort out, and respond to the input received from the world.
Motor Planning Skills: ability to plan, implement, and sequence motor tasks.

  How do we Evaluate a child?

An occupational therapy evaluation assesses a child’s gross motor skills, fine motor skills, visual motor skills, handwriting skills, daily living skills, oral motor skills, and sensory processing skills. The use of standardized assessment tools, non-standardized assessment tools, parent interview, and clinical observations are done to assess the child’s performance.

  What is Attention Deficit Disorder & ADHD?

Attention Deficit Disorder describes a behavior of persistent inattention that is more common and severe than in typical children of the same level of development. Attention Deficit Disorder is now classified as a separate category from Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder because not all children with the disorder are hyperactive.

  What is the Signs and Symptoms of ADD/ADHD?

Lacks attention to detail particularly in schoolwork
Trouble completing tasks, often shifts from one uncompleted task to another
Daydreamer does not follow instructions
Difficulty following conversations, frequently interrupts and/or loses interest of subject midpoint
Trouble remembering what someone just told them
Frequently losing or misplacing homework, schoolbooks or other items
Fidgeting and squirming or problems staying seated
Moving around constantly, often running or climbing inappropriately
Blurting out answers to questions without waiting to be called on
Difficulty with tasks that require taking turns
Inability to keep powerful emotions in check, resulting in angry outbursts or temper tantrums

  What is Autism?

Autism is a developmental disability that affects how the brain functions, specifically those areas of the brain that control social ability and communication skills.

Children with autism typically have difficulty in both verbal and nonverbal communication. They may have a difficulty in relating to the outside world and may have unusual reactions to the people around them. Children with autism may demonstrate aggressive behavior that may cause injury to themselves or others. The disorder also may cause sensitivity to the senses of sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste.

  What is Learning Disability?

A learning disability is not a problem with intelligence, often the individual's IQ falls within the normal range. Children and adults with a learning disorder have trouble processing sensory information, which interferes in their daily activities at school and work. They see, hear and understand things differently. A child with a learning disability cannot try harder, pay closer attention, or improve motivation on their own; they need help to learn how to do those things.

  What ist the Sign and Symptoms of Learning Disabilities?

Difficulty understanding and following instructions
Trouble remembering what someone just told them
Failing to master reading, spelling, writing, and/or math skills and therefore fails schoolwork
Difficulty telling the difference between "right" and "left," problems identifying words or a tendency to reverse letters, numbers or words (e.g., confusing "b" with "d," 18 with 81, or "on" with "no.")
Lacking motor coordination when walking, playing sports, holding a pencil or trying to tie a shoelace
Frequently loses or misplaces homework, schoolbooks or other items
Unable to understand the concept of time,confused by the differencebetween"yesterday" "today,"& "tomorrow"

  What is Handwriting Problems?

Many children have problem in their academics due to poor handwriting especially dyslexia (learning difficulty). Handwriting is a complex process of managing written language by coordinating the eyes, arms, hands, pencil grip, letter formation, and body posture. The development of a child’s handwriting can provide clues to developmental problems that may hinder the child’s learning.

  Treatment

Occupational therapy can provide intervention that helps children to develop appropriate social, play, and learning skills. The therapist aids the child in achieving and maintaining normal daily tasks.

Treatment focuses mainly on sensory integration therapy, which includes vestibular, proprioceptive and tactile stimulation.

Sensory integration (SI) is the process of receiving, organizing, and interpreting input, becoming the basis for motor planning, learning and behavior. When this process is disorganized, it is called Sensory Integration Dysfunction.

For Example rope ladder, a sensory ballpool, tunnel and vestibular equipment like swings etc., to address the many aspects of sensory integration and processing skills, including sensory awareness; visual spatial awareness; body integration; balance; fine, gross and bilateral motor coordination; visual-motor integration; praxis; muscle and joint integrity; self-care skills; and handwriting skills.

  VESTIBULAR MOVEMENT

Children NEED to move! For some it is difficult due to fears, for others they just cannot seem to get enough. Here are some activities for movement experiences...

T- DISC
FLAT SWING
SCOOTER BOARD

  PROPRIOCEPTIVE ACTIVITIES

These activities are almost endless in choices. Proprioception refers to input to the muscles, joints, ligaments, tendons and connective tissue. It refers to motor control and planning, body awareness, grading of movement (knowing how "hard" or "soft" to perform a task), and postural stability.

These children will have difficulty with both gross and fine motor tasks such as riding a bike, writing, walking, crawling, or playing sports. Some children also require additional proprioceptive input just to keep their bodies calm, organized, and arousal levels regulated.

  HEAVY WORK ACTIVITIES

These types of activities are imperative for children who have difficulty regulating their arousal levels. They are the crashers, the jumpers, the leg shakers, the ones that cannot ever seem to sit still. Regular heavy input into their neurological systems WILL help calm them down. Often these activities will include using weights, weighted products, jumping, bouncing, rocking, pushing, pulling, swinging and being "squished".

All kids need this! However, children with under-reactive neurological systems will need it even more. These activities are truly used for most sensory processing issues and can have an amazing affect on the nervous system for regulation and modulation.

  PLAY TUNNELS AND TENTS

The tunnel acts as an active gross motor and bilateral motor coordination activity just by having the child crawl through them. It creates a tactile experience by placing different textured objects or carpet squares inside the tunnel. Shaking the tunnel up (as in an earthquake) while the children are in helps to get increased proprioceptive input and vestibular reactions.

  SAND PLAY

Playing in the sand provides essential yet fun ways to experience necessary tactile input. It helps in improving creativity. Filling the tables with sand, rice, shaving cream, water, or any textured substance will help to encourage exploration too.

SAND PLAY (Tactile discrimination and fine motor)

  CLAY ACTIVITIES

Children need and love play doh and messy play, unless they have tactile defensiveness. There are so many types of play doh, scented to unscented, textured to non-textured. It also helps in improving fine motor co-ordination.

CONCLUSION

Occupational therapy thus plays an important role in improving the functional abilities of the children and promotes independence in their day-to-day activities.