Re: Here's that video of Maia playing xylophone at the Harlem Globetrotters
Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 9:54 am
Hi Holly,
Serial casting worked fast. It wasn't too heavy either - they used a fiberglass cast that they just wrapped on. The thing about it is that it's on 24/7 so the muscles never get a chance to contract at all during that whole time. But she's in that belly buster splint now just after being casted for a very short time. The splint is extremely lightweight - like feather just about. It's made out of a thin type of thermoplast - you heat it up in water and then shape it and it dries hard. All of Maia's past splints were really heavy, too and I do believe that they played a huge role in her dislocating (because of her posture at sleeptime). Her past splints had metal joints, etc. - that's what made them so heavy.
It's only been two weeks for Maia so far.... we may have one more week in this belly buster cast and then we move to nighttime only splinting - which will also be in a splint but without the punched out section that the belly buster has. And we're going to add a piece for the hand to help her ulnar deviation. I think that she'll probably have to sleep with something until she stops growing because when she sleeps she postures in a bent arm position and that's one of the reasons we got to a 40 degree contracture in the first place.
We cannot do Botox on Maia because she's a highly allergic child and she can't even get immunizations because of the reactions she's had (we tried 2x) - so we won't chance anything with Botox. But I can understand how someone might want to use Botox in a severely contracted muscle.
Best of luck with this,
francine
Serial casting worked fast. It wasn't too heavy either - they used a fiberglass cast that they just wrapped on. The thing about it is that it's on 24/7 so the muscles never get a chance to contract at all during that whole time. But she's in that belly buster splint now just after being casted for a very short time. The splint is extremely lightweight - like feather just about. It's made out of a thin type of thermoplast - you heat it up in water and then shape it and it dries hard. All of Maia's past splints were really heavy, too and I do believe that they played a huge role in her dislocating (because of her posture at sleeptime). Her past splints had metal joints, etc. - that's what made them so heavy.
It's only been two weeks for Maia so far.... we may have one more week in this belly buster cast and then we move to nighttime only splinting - which will also be in a splint but without the punched out section that the belly buster has. And we're going to add a piece for the hand to help her ulnar deviation. I think that she'll probably have to sleep with something until she stops growing because when she sleeps she postures in a bent arm position and that's one of the reasons we got to a 40 degree contracture in the first place.
We cannot do Botox on Maia because she's a highly allergic child and she can't even get immunizations because of the reactions she's had (we tried 2x) - so we won't chance anything with Botox. But I can understand how someone might want to use Botox in a severely contracted muscle.
Best of luck with this,
francine
