Abstract
Objective:
To evaluate the potential benefits of computer-assisted arm rehabilitation gaming technology on arm function of children with spastic cerebral palsy.
Design:
A single-blind randomized controlled trial design. Power calculations indicated that 58 children would be required to demonstrate a clinically important difference.
Setting:
Intervention was home-based; recruitment took place in regional spasticity clinics.
Participants:
A total of 15 children with cerebral palsy aged five to 12 years were recruited; eight to the device group.
Interventions:
Both study groups received ‘usual follow-up treatment’ following spasticity treatment with botulinum toxin; the intervention group also received a rehabilitation gaming device.
Main measures:
ABILHAND-kids and Canadian Occupational Performance Measure were performed by blinded assessors at baseline, six and 12 weeks.
Results:
An analysis of covariance showed no group differences in mean ABILHAND-kids scores between time points. A non-parametric analysis of variance on Canadian Occupational Performance Measure scores showed a statistically significant improvement across time points (χ2 (2,15) = 6.778, p = 0.031), but this improvement did not reach minimal clinically important difference. Mean daily device use was seven minutes. Recruitment did not reach target owing to unanticipated staff shortages in clinical services. Feedback from children and their families indicated that the games were not sufficiently engaging to promote sufficient use that was likely to result in functional benefits.
Conclusion:
This study suggests that computer-assisted arm rehabilitation gaming does not benefit arm function, but a Type II error cannot be ruled out.
Keywords
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
