Massage Therapy for Children with Down Syndrome - Essay Example

Children with Down syndrome in motor functioning and muscle tone following massage therapy: A critical appreciation This study investigates whether the addition of massage therapy to an early intervention program may enhance motor functioning and increase muscle tone for children with Down syndrome. The hypothesis sets the study that massage therapy might enhance motor development beyond maturation effects expected for children with Down syndrome. This message therapy improved gross motor, feeding, social and cognition scores for both groups attributed to the effects of the Early Intervention programme. Order#: 193294 (Revision) Deadline: 2007-11-25 21:34 Style: Harvard Language Style: English UK Pages: 6 Sources: 10 Writer ID: 6746 INTRODUCTION: In reference to 'Early Child Development and Care' fine motor skills abridges a coordination of small muscle movements in the fingers usually in coordination with the eyes. In application to motor skills of hands and fingers, there is active involvement of other parts of the body in children including the brain. The abilities that involve the use of hands develop over time, starting with primitive gestures such as grabbing at objects to more precise activities demands precise hand-eye coordination. Such skills primarily involve a refined use of the small muscles controlling the hand, fingers, and thumb. The development of these skills allows one to be able to complete tasks such as writing, drawing, and buttoning. The claim of the author in "Children with Down syndrome improved in motor functioning and muscle tone following massage therapy" have solid basis based on empirical evidences and a pilot project to bring the findings home positively. The gist of the book dealt with Early Childhood and Care yields adequate supports in the education and health care industry. The outcome of this pilot practice oriented research are nonetheless inspiring which suggest that when added to an Early Intervention program, massage therapy may enhance motor functioning and limb muscle tone for young children with Down syndrome. This significant motor functioning and muscle strength are pivotal for achieving postural, manipulative and locomotors milestones. It is closely observed that attenuating motor functioning delays may in turn contribute to increased self-esteem in school-aged children with Down syndrome. The author with his ambitious team believe that if future research supports the massage benefits, then massage would be a focal point as an adjunct to Early Intervention services for therapists, teachers and parents to learn and incorporate in the daily routine of children with disabilities. PRESCHOOL YEARS ARE VITAL The pedagogical work of accurate scientific observation, experiment and finding through the project " message therapy." establishes the fact that physiological attention to the cognitive growth help the child of special need enormously. The experiment brings the idea home that right nurturing of kids leads a better yield in terms of mental and physical abilities in children. According to Essa, E., Young, R. & Lehne, L., 'Introduction to Early Childhood Education', 2nd Ed.1998, during the infant and toddler years, children develop basic grasping and manipulation skills, which are refined during the preschool years. The preschooler becomes quite adept in self-help, construction, holding grips, and bimanual control tasks requiring the use of both hands. When the child enters middle childhood, they make great progress in their artistic abilities. They begin to express themselves through drawing, sculpting, and clay modeling. Empirical evidences suggest that massage therapy works wonder on children if carried out according to pediatric guidelines. Down syndrome, a genetic condition affecting one in about 800 children born in the western countries characteristically confines cognitive deficits (Nichols et al., 2003; Seung & Chapman, 2004), speech problems (Kennedy & Flynn, 2002; Laws & Bishop, 2003), and motor and perceptual developmental problems (John et al., 2004; Kearney & Gentile, 2003).Children with Down syndrome also frequently present with decreased muscle tone or hypotonia (Bodensteiner et al., 2003; Martin, 2004). The primary objective of the present study was to examine whether massage therapy improved muscle tone in children with Down syndrome. The publication of the work "Message Therapy." receives professional admiration when twenty-one moderate to high functioning young children with the mean age group of two years old having Down syndrome received early intervention physical therapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy. They were randomly assigned to additional task to receive two 0.5-hour massage therapy or reading sessions as control group per week for two months. On the first and last day of the study, the children's functioning levels were assessed using the Developmental Programming for Infants and Young Children scale, and muscle tone was assessed using a new preliminary scale such as the Arms, Legs and Trunk Muscle Tone Score. The achievement marked an immense appreciation when the author illustrated the data and strong analytical interpretation through appropriate tools and resources. EXERCISES HELP TO FORM SHAPE AND FIRMNESS Physical exercise and other activities have found to increase muscle strength and motor skills in typically developing children (Faigenbaum et al., 2002) and children with physical disabilities (Wang & Ju,2002; Dodd et al., 2003). The remarkable merits of exercise provide atypically developing children with the experience of normal movement, which might lead to quicker attainment of milestone skills (Horn et al., 1995; Ulrich et al., 2001). Motor training that focused on stimulating trunk rotation, increasing muscle tone, reducing atypical movement and increasing typical movement patterns improve gross and fine motor skills, kinesthetic and tactile perception (Bjornhage et al., 1990). Following an intense study Gibson and Harris (1988) reported that early interventions led to better outcomes than having children receiving good care giving at home. Their Study reported improvements in children with Down syndrome following three months of sensory integrative therapy with puzzles, block design, body awareness, tactile perception, visual-motor coordination etc. including vestibular stimulation such as linear swinging, therapy ball activities, balance on stairs and ramps sought after three months of neurodevelopment therapy. Massage therapy involves skin-to-skin contact and includes stretching, pressing, rubbing, flexing and extending extremities at levels tolerant to children. Further, one pilot massage study with 13 children with Down Syndrome between one and four years of age revealed increased muscle activation and less severe hypo tonicity (Linkous & Stutts, 1990) suggesting positive massage effects. One-half of the children with Down syndrome benefited to a massage therapy group and the other one-half to a reading control group. The reading sessions consisted of a therapist holding and reading stories to the child for 0.5 hours on the same time schedule as the massage therapy group. The children were attending mainstreamed Preschool programs whose policy included integrating typically and atypically developing children. The final sample consisted of 21 children, 13 males and the ethnic distribution was 1/3 Caucasian, 1/3 Hispanic and 1/3 African-American. It is no wonder children with Down syndrome followed a routine musical stimulation during the programme. Although the focus of this paper is on massage therapy, a treatment that is not typically prescribed for children with motor problems but based on recent research findings for other children may enhance development for children with Down syndrome, such as improve muscle tone and motor development has some shortcomings too. The author appears to be authentic and realistic when he confronts the minor aspects of the observation. In an excellent review of early intervention for children with motor disabilities, reveals the importance of therapeutic exercise for developing normal movement patterns. Although parents may be trained to deliver therapeutic exercises, it is difficult to monitor their consistent delivery of interventions at home. Further, the profile read although physical exercise is important for motor development; it is not well tolerated by children with Down syndrome, possibly because of their low muscle tone. TRAINED FACULTY ON THE MOVE The teachers met State certification for teaching and standards for the State's Health and Rehabilitative Service Programme. Besides the daily activities of a regular preschool program finger painting, singing, listening to stories and playground time in the morning and afternoon), the Early Intervention program required one hour of nap time, lunch and provided the children with one hour per week of physical therapy, one hour per week of occupational therapy and between 30 and 60 minutes per week of speech therapy. Volunteer massage therapists with interests in pediatric massage got training in order to follow the written protocol. The reading sessions were the nucleus focus on the same time schedule as the massage therapy sessions; that is, for 0.5 hours twice a week for two months. THE YIELD OF THE PROGRAMME The therapist conducted the following sequence three times with the child in a supine position: Legs & feet, Stomach, Chest, Arms & hands, Face and Back. As expected, all the children showed developmental gains in all areas across the two-month period in gross motor, self-care, feeding, toileting, hygiene skills, emotional intelligence, language and cognition. The study led to conclude that enhance motor development beyond maturation effects expected for children with Down syndrome. This helped to improve gross motor, feeding, social and cognition scores. In the current study involving children with Down syndrome with increased muscle strength have contributed to better muscle tone for the massage therapy group from the pressure stimulation.. One limitation of the present study was that the DPIYC, which profiles a child's age, range between 12-15 months as opposed to a developmental age in months. The ALT was used in this study as an exploratory tool because a literature review failed to yield a pediatric scale that was sensitive to less than major changes in muscle tone. The therapists recommend massage as an adjunct to Early Intervention services for therapists, teachers and parents to learn and incorporate in the daily routine of children especially with physically challenged ones. When the hypothesis sets its roots proclaiming massage therapy develops muscle tone, then children receiving massage therapy might also show improved motor development. This secondary objective of the study examined the apt link task whether enhancing muscle tone and motor functioning would also be associated with enhanced development of other areas to provide the basis for development of other areas via motor proficiency and the outcome was a futuristic one. REFERENCES & SOURCES Articles from Books: 1. Craig, G., Kermis, M. & Digdon, N. (2001) Children today, 2nd Ed. Prentice Hall: Toronto 2. Essa, E., Young, R. & Lehne, L. (1998) Introduction to early childhood education, 2nd Ed. Nelson: Toronto 3. Nichols et al., 2003; Seung & Chapman, 2004 4. Kennedy & Flynn, 2002; Laws & Bishop, 2003), 5. Warren, B. (2003) Using Creative Arts in Therapy, e-book, London. Rout ledge 6. Darnley-Smith, R. and Patey, H.M. (2003) Music Therapy (Creative Therapies in Practice) Websites: 7. www.speech-therapy.org.uk Journals and other quotes: 8. The British Journal of Occupational Therapy 9. Speech and Language Therapy in Practice 10. Rush, (2006)The Australia Institute http://www.tai.org.au/documents. 11. Bodensteiner et al., 2003; Martin, 2004. 12. 'The Effect of hypo tonicity' -Linkous & Stutts, 1990 Read More