Brainpalsy.com – Helping Parents Combat Cerebral Palsy

Cerebral palsy attorneys are an important part of the process of dealing with this difficult disease and some of the medical problems associated come with it. Medical science continues to advance and introduce new treatments to fight cerebral palsy. Attorneys, however, are a necessary part of the picture because they hold medical professionals responsible when their actions cause great suffering and possible long-term consequences for cerebral palsy victims. A good cerebral palsy attorney can help ensure patients receive the best possible medical treatment and care.

Treatments and the Role of the Cerebral Palsy Attorney.

Because cerebral palsy has no cure yet, most treatment plans are individually designed to ameliorate symptoms, especially neurological ones. A good cerebral palsy attorney can act like a safety check for a patient’s medical care, making sure they receive the treatments they deserve. These cerebral palsy treatments include:

* Therapy aimed at increasing patient self-sufficiency


* Pharmaceuticals to abate spasms and seizures


* Physical therapy to increase coordination and muscular control


* Speech therapy


* Self-confidence counseling to assist in creating emotional balance


* Braces or other prosthetics to assist movement


* Botox treatment for muscle spasms


* The Baclofen pump to dose patients internally with regular doses of an anti-spasm drug


* Dorsal rhizotomy surgery for leg stiffness and spasms

Obviously, some of these treatments are more invasive and more risky than others. A good cerebral palsy attorney can quickly analyze treatments and outcomes and help you determine if a medical complication is the result of an operating room mishap or ill-advised procedure. Cerebral palsy attorneys are knowledge sources, and if there is any ambiguity about a questionable medical treatment, they can call upon top-notch medical experts and doctors to research the best cerebral palsy treatments for your child.

Risky Cerebral Palsy Treatments

Three of the more controversial cerebral palsy treatments include Botox, the Baclofen pump and dorsal rhizotomy.

Botox, a product made from the Botulism toxin, is a strong poison, but in small doses it can be injected into muscles to stop or reduce muscle spasms for many weeks. This creates emotional and physical relief for the patient and allows them to pursue beneficial therapies that would otherwise be impossible. Of course, in large doses it can paralyze or even kill.

The Baclofen pump is a surgically-implanted device that, when installed in the abdominal body cavity, regularly doses the patient’s spinal cord with an anti-spasmatic drug. However, it is a dangerous surgical procedure that can result in infection, and if the product is dysfunctional, it can overdose the patient.

Dorsal rhizotomy is the removal of several back vertebrae (spinal segments) and the severing of some of the nerves that cause spastic leg movements. This operation, though drastic, can have permanent benefits, including better movement, breathing, sitting, flexibility and motor control. Of course, it also can result in back problems and, at worst, complete paralysis.

Why You May Need a Cerebral Palsy Attorney

No one likes to see a child enter the world burdened with the need for painful and difficult cerebral palsy treatments, but such things happen every day. When this burden is caused by an avoidable birth injury related to the medical treatment of the mother and her baby, it’s especially sad.

Sometimes these medical accidents are the result of carelessness, a lack of consideration for patients, overly aggressive medical advice, badly-maintained equipment, physician malpractice or interest between profit and patient well-being. If you suspect your child’s cerebral palsy was caused by an avoidable birth injury, you should immediately contact a Cerebral Palsy Attorney

Any time that a person suffers damage to his or her brain, there is the chance that they will suffer from long-term damage and disability. However, when this damage occurs during the years where a child’s brain is still developing, the chance of long-term disability is much greater.

Cerebral palsy, or CP, is a name given to describe a group of non-contagious, non-progressive brain injuries that result in physical disability due to damage of the motor centers of the brain. For a brain injury to be labeled cerebral palsy it must involve damage to a still-developing brain, usually in unborn or young children (under the age of three).

Understanding Cerebral Palsy

As mentioned above, cerebral palsy is a non-progressive order. This means that the disease will not continue to cause further damage to the brain once the initial trauma takes place, something that makes CP different from a lot of other brain injuries.

Unfortunately, there is no cure, and so once the initial damage is inflicted, a person with CP will experience physical disability for his or her entire life. There are some treatment options, however, that can ease some of the pain and suffering that CP brings and that can reduce the likelihood of secondary complications from arising.

How Does a Person Get Cerebral Palsy?

Cerebral palsy only affects young children in the formative stages of brain development. Most instances of CP are birth injuries. 75% of all cases are due to injuries that occurred during pregnancy. 5% are the result of the birthing process itself, and the final 10% are because of brain injuries that took place during the early years of a child’s life (usually before the age of three).

Classification of Cerebral Palsy

Cerebral palsy is divided into four different classifications that each describes a different type of movement impairment. The differences between movement impairments relates to the area of the brain that has been affected. The four groupings are

· Spastic

· Athetoid / dyskinetic

· Ataxic

· Mixed

Spastic is by far the most common type of cerebral palsy, accounting for 70-80% of all cases. People with spastic cerebral palsy are hypertonic and suffer from a tightening of the muscles and an inability to stretch a muscle. Because of this, people with spastic CP also suffer from spasticity in certain muscles.

Mild cerebral palsy is often difficult to detect, thus early treatment is not given. When detected at early stage, corrective treatment can be applied and may help the patient greatly.

A child with a mild form of this disability may have trouble lifting a large object with the right hand but may have no difficulty on writing with a chalk or a pen. This means, that it affects only the physical ability of the child, but not the intelligence.

When the child seems normal in every way, it is more difficult to diagnose with limited physical coordination. A normal child will be able to perform in the gym class without trouble, but a child with this cerebral palsy may be less coordinated. This will give the child so much frustration even though having excellent record on other areas like being on top of the class.

This is just one of the many forms of cerebral palsy, a condition of the nervous system that affects coordination of muscle and over-all body movement. Unlike the Down syndrome, it has many possible causes. It is caused by brain injury sustained during pregnancy, or during and after childbirth.

When a mother had a particularly difficult pregnancy and/or child delivery, the child may have incurred brain damage and must always be observed for symptoms like difficulties on use of one or more limbs.

Children with cerebral palsy that is mild and have normal learning abilities may be disqualified for financial assistance provided to more severe forms.