Objective measurement of clinical findings in the use of botulinum toxin type A for the management of children with cerebral palsy

Abstract

Clinicians use a range of clinical and objective measures to quantify the positive and negative features (impairments) of the upper motor neurone syndrome. These measures play an important role in the assessment and selection of suitable candidates for intervention and monitoring of outcome. Intervention strategies often focus on the positive features; however, outcome may be more contingent upon the severity of the negative features. The clinical protocol for patient selection and treatment used by our multidisciplinary team is presented, together with details of the assessment procedure. Measurement tools in routine use are described, including: the Modified Ashworth Scale, the Modified Tardieu Scale (‘R1’), muscle length by joint range of motion ‘R2’, three‐dimensional gait analysis, assessments of strength by the Medical Research Council Scale, Selective Motor Control, the Gross Motor Function Measure and the Observational Gait Scale. Three case studies of children with cerebral palsy who underwent botulinum toxin type A treatment as part of their management of gait disorder are presented, a 2‐year‐old girl with mild hemiplegia (‘true equinus’), a 3‐year‐old boy with moderate hemiplegia (‘apparent equinus’) and a 6‐year‐old girl with diplegia, where a targeted approach was used to treat a distal problem and resulted in correction Of a proximal problem.