The Effects of Static Anti-pronation Splint on Activities of Spastic Hemiplegic Children

Cerebral palsy is a common cause of disability in childhood that effects on posture and motor development and leads in activity limitation.In this children, the function of hand and arm become problematic and this can lead to disability in doing of activities of daily living. Orthosis and splints are used to improve position, range of motion, hand function and finally can improve doing of activities in children. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of static anti-pronation splint on activity,spasticity, range of motion, and function of affected hand of spastic hemiplegic children of 8-12 years old.
This study is a single blind randomised control trial that was approved by ethical committee of Tehran University of Medical Scienses(Irct ID: IRCT2014042717450N1 ). 20 spastic hemiplegic cerebral palsy children with 8 to 12 years old were selected through students who studied in physical disabled schools in Tehran city and had the inclusion criteria.Patients randomly divided into intervention and control group.Patients in intervention group used a static anti-pronation splint for two months, 6 hours daily.Duration of using the splint was 3 sets of 2 hours a day. In this study the Activity Scale for Kids was used to evaluate activitiy implementation of children, the Modified Ashworth Scale was used to assess spasticity of wrist, forearm and elbow, ROM of wrist, forearm and elbow were tested with goniometer and Box & Block test was used to evaluate hand function.
The results in intervention and control group were interpreted and compared together. Results in intervention group showed a significant improvement in activities of children(p0.05) . In comparing the results of intervention and control group, before the study there was not a significant diference between two groups but after study, the diference was significant.
Information from present research shows that using static anti-pronation splint for 2 months ,6 hours a day, can be an effective method to improve activity implementation, wrist and forearm spasticity and range of motion and hand function in hemiplegic CP children.