What is Pediatric Physical Therapy?

Physical therapy is a healthcare profession concerned with helping people of all ages to better physically move their body throughout all environments and situations.  For children, this typically means playing and learning, exploring, climbing, riding and getting on/off, in/out, and around obstacles in their environment.

A PT provides carefully designed challenges based on a child’s unique interests to build strength, joint mobility, range of motion, endurances, and the ability to use muscles together around joints and in the trunk.  As the physical implies, PTs work on skills that allow a child to physically do the following:

Children are driven to move higher against gravity.  Sometimes they can’t master control for staying safe and not falling.  This can be due to weakness or confusion about how to interpret where their body is in relation to their support. A PT can help identify the underlying problem with the balance control and help strengthen or increase awareness to lead the child to greater success in their motor exploration.  

Children love to climb and explore pushing and pulling toys.  Once they can successfully get onto a toy they will then try to move the toy using rocking, pushing, and shifting their weight.  If a child is avoiding climbing or unable to succeed, a PT can help determine the root cause of their challenges.  They can attend to strength, range of motion and motor coordination to help the child gain motor skills higher off the floor and on objects they can move.  

Master Transfers And Moving Through Barriers

A child needs to learn how to coordinate movement in their heads, arms, legs and trunk to successfully get in and out of bed, the bathtub, the car, their chair, etc.  They also must learn how to stay balanced when they try to open and move through a heavy door and when they open the refrigerator.  When a child is not stable in their legs and trunk they aren’t able to do these types of tasks.  A PT can help them learn to stay stable in their and legs and gain strength for transfers.

Master Visual-Perceptual Motor Control

Children can hit, kick, throw at a target, shoot a ball and catch using their control between their eyes with their hands and feet.  Some children have difficulty learning to understand distances and force for many of these skills.  A PT can help determine if this is due to balance deficits, coordination problems, depth perception, strength, or a combination of many of these pieces.

Use Motor Skills For Interaction With Peers

Children learn many motor skills such as skipping, standing on one leg, climbing up and down stairs, hopping on one and two feet, galloping, rolling, somersaults, and jumping.  These foundational motor skills support the child’s ability to play on playgrounds and in sporting activities.  They also allow the child to successfully move toys in their environment to invent other motor experiences.  By playing with their motor control they gain confidence and a greater awareness of many concepts that will help their future learning in reading, math, and science.  By experiencing things with their physical body they can relate concepts taught later in their development.  Even if a child can’t move independently in these ways, a PT can help them have experiences that allow them to learn about their 3-dimensional world.

Throughout life, the patterns of motor control we use affect the muscles that are strengthened and the alignment of our joints. When a child is using poorly aligned patterns to move they will develop muscle contractures and joint limitations. More importantly, the human being's boney system changes from infancy to adulthood. These changes must occur to insure the joint stability of the spine, shoulders, and major weight bearing structures. If this doesn't occur, the joints may collapse and fail to support the structure and weight of the body throughout the individual's lifespan. PT's work to address specific alignment and strength deficiencies or imbalances through a variety of therapeutic activities.