OBJECTIVE: to investigate the impact of a thumb abduction orthosis on functional skills of a child with hemiparetic cerebral palsy and mild spasticity. METHODS: an AB single-subject design was used in this study. Baseline A consisted of data collected during a period without intervention (control conditions). The intervention phase B included the use of a thumb abduction orthosis in association with traditional occupational therapy. The baseline lasted six weeks and the intervention period eight weeks. Assessments were performed once a week throughout the study and included hand function tests and range of motion measures for active wrist extension and flexion and thumb abduction and opponency. The Celeration Line and Two-Standard Deviation Band methods, as well as Visual Analysis, were used for data analysis. RESULTS: the child demonstrated significant improvements in the range of active motions. A trend towards a reduction in the time to perform manual tasks was observed, but this was only statistically significant in the case of the task of stacking blocks. CONCLUSION: the results suggest that thumb abduction orthosis may be a useful adjunct treatment to improve the range of active hand motions in children with hemiparetic cerebral palsy.
Orthosis; Thumb; Cerebral palsy
