Harnessing Mobility: A Medically Complex Child's Home Program Utilizing an In-Home Body Weight Support System.

Purpose: To describe a home program for a child with medical complexity using an over-ground body weight support (BWS) system.

Summary Of Key Points: Children with medical complexity often use home programs due to challenges with regular therapy attendance. In this case, effective home program components including child centered design, family leadership, and best practice principles were prioritized around the PUMA (portable mobility aid for children).

Real-world environmental enrichment rehabilitation paradigm in people with severe traumatic brain injury: a pilot feasibility study.

Background: The use of Environmental Enrichment (EE) has been widely studied in animal models. However, the application of the same in humans is limited to rehabilitation settings.

Objective: To investigate the feasibility of a community-based EE paradigm in adults with brain injury.

ON Time Mobility: Advocating for Mobility Equity.

Mobility is a human right. The traditional definition of mobility in physical therapy practice is centered on translocation and, while accurate, is not comprehensive. In this article, we propose the ON Time Mobility framework: that all children have the right to be mobile throughout their development to explore, engage in relationships, and develop agency to cocreate their lives.

Early exploration of one's own body, exploration of objects, and motor, language, and cognitive development relate dynamically across the first two years of life.

Early exploratory behaviors have been proposed to facilitate children's learning, impacting motor, cognitive, language, and social development. This study related the performance of behaviors used to explore oneself to behaviors used to explore objects, and then related both types of exploratory behaviors to motor, language, and cognitive measures longitudinally from 3 through 24 months of age via secondary analysis of an existing dataset. Participants were 52 children (23 full-term, 29 preterm).

Feasibility of a home-based environmental enrichment paradigm to enhance purposeful activities in adults with traumatic brain injury: a case series.

Purpose: To assess the feasibility, safety, and functional recovery of an Environmental Enrichment (EE) inspired paradigm for enhancing daily activities in people with traumatic brain injury.

Methods: Two TBI-Caregiver dyads participated in the six-month study. A preinstalled harness provided the support structure that enabled the family to perform task-specific functional and cognitive goals.

In-Home Mobility Training With a Portable Body Weight Support System of an Infant With Down Syndrome.

Purpose: To report on the feasibility of an open-area, portable body weight support system (PBWSS) for in-home use and overground mobility training in an infant with Down syndrome.

Summary Of Key Points: The family used the PBWSS on average 4 days/week and for a mean duration of 27.9 minutes/day.

GEARing smart environments for pediatric motor rehabilitation.

Background: There is a lack of early (infant) mobility rehabilitation approaches that incorporate natural and complex environments and have the potential to concurrently advance motor, cognitive, and social development. The Grounded Early Adaptive Rehabilitation (GEAR) system is a pediatric learning environment designed to provide motor interventions that are grounded in social theory and can be applied in early life. Within a perceptively complex and behaviorally natural setting, GEAR utilizes novel body-weight support technology and socially-assistive robots to both ease and encourage mobility in young children through play-based, child-robot interaction.

Exploratory analysis of a developmentally progressive modified ride-on car intervention for young children with Down syndrome.

Background: Children with Down syndrome (DS) may have limited opportunities to engage in self-directed mobility and play due to motor delays. A recent modified ride-on car innovation is the sit-to-stand (STS) model, which incorporates functional standing and walking training with the experience of powered mobility.

Aims: This study aimed to: (1) describe total dosage and daily usage of three modified ride-on car modes (seated, standing, and power-push) by young children with DS; (2) examine the ability of young children with DS to independently activate the modified ride-on car in seated and standing modes; (3) describe the age of onset of selected motor milestones of the sample in comparison to DS norms.

User-centred assistive technology assessment of a portable open-area body weight support system for in-home use.

Purpose: Current paediatric technology lacks mobility devices that support early, high-dose and variable movement that can be managed by professionals and parents outside of the lab or clinic. Parent acceptability of the technology is a critical piece to the continued use of devices by their infants. The purpose of this study was to determine the level of feasibility of an in-home application of a novel portable body weight support system (PBWSS), designed for community use.

Standing Tall: Feasibility of a Modified Ride-On Car That Encourages Standing.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to determine the feasibility of infants with Down syndrome to use a modified ride-on car with seated and standing modes.

Methods: Participants included 4 infants with Down syndrome. Families were asked to provide at least 8 minutes of modified ride-on car driving per day, at least 5 times per week throughout the 9-month intervention.

Means-end problem solving in infancy: Development, emergence of intentionality, and transfer of knowledge.

Behaviors and performance of 23 typically developing infants were assessed longitudinally at 6, 9, 12, 18, and 24 months in two means-end tasks: pulling a towel or rotating a turntable to obtain a supported object. With age, infants performed more goal-directed behaviors, leading to increased problem-solving success. Intentionality emerged earlier in the towel task than in the turntable task (6.

Use of an In-Home Body Weight Support System by a Child With Spina Bifida.

Purpose: To examine the feasibility of a new open-area body weight support system (BWSS) to act as both an "assistive" and a "rehabilitative" device within the home.

Intervention: A 5-year-old boy with spina bifida used the BWSS during self-selected activities for 10 weeks. Feasibility, behavioral, and clinical assessments provided a quantification of his activity in and out of the BWSS.

Sitting Together And Reaching To Play (START-Play): Protocol for a Multisite Randomized Controlled Efficacy Trial on Intervention for Infants With Neuromotor Disorders.

Background: There is limited research examining the efficacy of early physical therapy on infants with neuromotor dysfunction. In addition, most early motor interventions have not been directly linked to learning, despite the clear association between motor activity and cognition during infancy.

Objective: The aim of this project is to evaluate the efficacy of Sitting Together And Reaching To Play (START-Play), an intervention designed to target sitting, reaching, and motor-based problem solving to advance global development in infants with motor delays or neuromotor dysfunction.

Prematurity may negatively impact means-end problem solving across the first two years of life.

Preterm infants are at risk for delays in motor, perceptual, and cognitive development. While research has shown preterm infants may exhibit learning delays in the first months of life, these delays are commonly under-diagnosed. The purpose of this study was to longitudinally evaluate behavioral performance and learning in two means-end problem-solving tasks for 30 infants born preterm (PT) and 23 born full-term (FT).

Mobility in pictures: a participatory photovoice narrative study exploring powered mobility provision for children and families.

Aim: Rehabilitation professionals are increasingly recognizing mobility as a basic human right and endorsing the efficacy of early powered mobility for children with mobility impairments to foster independence, promote socialization with peers and facilitate participation in family and community life. However, the relationship between mobility and technology provision, when considered in the context of lived experiences of children with mobility impairments and their families, is complex and understudied. Perceptions of these experiences from children's own points of view are especially limited, as is the use of participatory research methods in describing these experiences.

Modified Ride-On Car Use by Young Children With Disabilities.

Purpose: The purpose of this single-subject case series study is to determine the effect of modified ride-on car use in natural environments on mobility.

Method: Three children younger than 2 years diagnosed with various disabilities participated in this 24-week study using a modified ride-on car in their home and community.

Results: All 3 children demonstrated an ability to independently use the modified ride-on car and enjoyed doing so.

Infants Born Preterm Demonstrate Impaired Exploration of Their Bodies and Surfaces Throughout the First 2 Years of Life.

Background: Non-object-oriented exploratory behaviors infants perform with their bodies and surfaces have been proposed to be key precursors of infants' object exploration, early learning, and future cognitive development. Little is known about the developmental trajectories of these behaviors, especially for infants born preterm.

Objective: The purpose of the study was to longitudinally compare non-object-oriented exploratory behaviors performed by full-term and preterm infants.

Go baby go café: a case study on an immersive rehabilitation environment to improve functional outcomes and quality of life.

Purpose: To determine the effectiveness of involving traumatic brain injury survivors in a novel "enriched rehabilitation environment" in which physical, cognitive, social and speech impairments are simultaneously addressed during training within a functioning business.

Method: Participant was a 34-year old with a history of a severe head injury 17 years ago due to a motor vehicle accident. A novel intervention was provided within the Go Baby Go Café at the University of Delaware during her two hour shifts, three times a week for 2 months.

Power-Up: Exploration and Play in a Novel Modified Ride-On Car for Standing.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to compare the physical activity and play behaviors of preschoolers without disabilities and 1 preschooler with physical disability.

Methods: Participants were 42 preschoolers without disabilities and 1 preschooler with physical disability (Child A). Child A used either crutches or a modified ride-on car while in the gymnasium and playground.

Why We Move: Social Mobility Behaviors of Non-Disabled and Disabled Children across Childcare Contexts.

Background: Social mobility is defined as the co-occurrence of self-directed locomotion and direct peer interaction. Social mobility is a product of dynamic child-environment interactions and thus likely to vary across contexts (e.g.

Feasibility and Effectiveness of a Novel Exoskeleton for an Infant With Arm Movement Impairments.

Purpose: To determine whether a novel exoskeletal device (Pediatric-Wilmington Robotic Exoskeleton [P-WREX]) is feasible and effective for intervention to improve reaching and object interaction for an infant with arm movement impairments.

Methods: An 8-month old infant with arthrogryposis was followed up every 2 weeks during a 1-month baseline, 3-month intervention, and 1-month postintervention. At each visit, reaching and looking behaviors were assessed.

Infant born preterm have delayed development of adaptive postural control in the first 5 months of life.

Unlabelled: Infants born preterm are at increased risk of developmental disabilities, that may be attributed to their early experiences and ability to learn. The purpose of this paper was to evaluate the ability of infants born preterm to adapt their postural control to changing task demands.

Methods: This study included 18 infants born at 32 weeks of gestation or less whose posture was compared in supine under 2 conditions, with and without a visual stimulus presented.

Modified Ride-on Car Use by Children With Complex Medical Needs.

Purpose: The purpose of this report was to determine the feasibility of short-term modified ride-on car (ROC) use for exploration and enjoyment by children with complex medical needs.

Methods: A single-subject research design was used (n = 3; age, 6 months to 5 years). Children were video-recorded using their modified ROC.

Real-World Performance: Physical Activity, Play, and Object-Related Behaviors of Toddlers With and Without Disabilities.

Purpose: To describe and compare the occurrence and co-occurrence of physical activity (PA), play, and object-related behaviors in toddlers with and without disabilities.

Methods: Participants included 23 toddlers (21 with typical development (TD) and 2 with disabilities). Direct observation was used to describe the type and level of PA, play interactions, and object-related behaviors through video recordings.

Why the time is right for a radical paradigm shift in early powered mobility: the role of powered mobility technology devices, policy and stakeholders.

This article explores the changing landscape of early pediatric powered mobility. We specifically focus on key indicators that suggest pediatric powered mobility technology (PMT) practice for very young children is poised for a radical paradigm shift. This shift will challenge the current purview of PMT design and function, how it is obtained, and its introduction to children and their families.